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VOCATIONAL SERIES 

EDITED BY 

E. HERSHEY SNEATH, Ph.D., LL.D., Yale Ukiveksity 



THE YOUNG IVIAN AND 
CIVIL ENGINEERING 



VOCATIONAL SERIES 

Edited By 
E. HERSHEY SNEATH, 

Ph.D., LL.D., Yale University. 



The Young Man and the Law. Simeon E. 

Baldwin. 
The Young Man and Teaching. Henry 

Parks Wright. 
The Young Man and Civil Engineering. 

George Fillmore Swain. 



THE YOUNG MAN AND 
CIVIL ENGINEERING 



BY 

GEORGE FILLMORE SWAIN 

Gordon McKay Professor of Civil Engineering in Harvard Uni- 
versity; Past-President of the American Society of Civil 
Engineers; formerly Chairman of the Boston Transit 
Commission, etc.; ConsiJting Engineer 



THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1922 

All rights reserved 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



-^'tl'^ 



CtoPTEIGHT, 1922, 

bt the macmillan company. 



Set up and electrotyped. Published March, 1922. 



Press of 

J. J. Little & Ives Company 

New York. U. S. A. 



MAY 1 7 1922 

8)n!.A674145 



"There be three things which make a nation great 
and prosperous: a fertile soil, busy workshops, and 
the easy conveyance of men and commodities from 
one place to another." Bacon. 

"Of all inventions, the alphabet and the printing 
press alone excepted, those inventions which abridge 
distance have done most for the civilization of our 
species." Macaulay. 

"What is vulgar, and the essence of all vulgarity, 
but the avarice of reward? 'Tis the difference of 
artisan and artist, of talent and genius, of sinner and 
saint. The man whose eyes are nailed, not on the 
nature of his act, but on the wages, — whether it be 
money, or office, or fame, — ^is almost equally low." 

Emebsox. 



EDITOR'S PROSPECTUS 

One of the most important decisions a young man is 
called upon to make relates to the determination of his 
life-work. It is fraught with serious consequence for 
him. It involves the possibilities of success and fail- 
ure. The social order is such that he can best realize 
his ends by the pursuit of a vocation. It unifies his 
purposes and endeavors — making them count for most 
in the struggle for existence and for material welfare. 
It furnishes steady employment at a definite task as 
against changeable eifort and an unstable task. This 
makes for superior skill and greater efficiency which 
result in a larger gain to himself and in a more genuine 
contribution to the economic world. 

Sut a man's vocation relates to a much wider sphere 
than the economic. It is intimately associated with 
the totality of his interests. It is in a very real sense 
the center of most of his relations in life. His intel- 
lectual interests are seriously dependent upon his vo- 
cational career. Not only does the attainment of skill 
and efficiency call for the acquisition of knowledge and 
development of judgment, but the leisure that is so 
essential to the pursuit of those intellectual ends which 
are a necessary part of his general culture is, in turn, 
dependent, to a considerable extent, upon the skill and 
efficiency that he acquires in his vocation. 

vii 



VIU EDITOR S PROSPECTUS 

Nor are his social interests less dependent upon his 
life-work. Men pursuing the same calling constitute 
in a peculiar sense a great fraternity or brotherhood 
bound together by conunon interests and aims. These 
condition much of his social development. His wider 
social relationships also are dependent, in a large 
measure, on the success that he attains in his chosen 
field of labor. 

Even his moral and spiritual interests are vitally 
centered in his vocation. The development of will, the 
steadying of purpose, the unfolding of ideals, the 
cultivation of vocational virtues, such as industry, 
fidelity, order, honesty, prudence, thrift, patience, per- 
sistence, courage, self-reliance, etc. — all of this makes 
tremendously for his moral and spiritual development. 
The vocationless man, no matter to what class he be- 
longs, suffers a great moral and spiritual disadvantage. 
His life lacks idealization and is therefore wanting in 
unity and high moralization. His changeable task, 
with its changeable efforts, does not afford so good an 
opportunity for the development of the economic and 
social virtues as that afforded the man who pursues a 
definite life-work. It lacks also that discipline — not 
only mental, but moral — which the attainment of vo- 
cational skin and efficiency involves. 

But notwithstanding the important issues involved 
in a man's vocational career, little has been done in 
a practical or systematic way to help our college young 
men to a wise decision in the determination of their 



EDITOR S PROSPECTUS . IX 

life-work. Commendable efforts are being put forth 
in our public schools in this direction, but very little, 
indeed, has been done in this respect in the sphere of 
higher education. To any one familiar with the strug- 
gles of the average college student in his efforts to 
settle this weighty question for himself, the perplex- 
ities, embarrassment, and apparent helplessness are pa- 
thetic. This is due largely to his ignorance of the 
nature of the professions and other vocations which 
appeal most strongly to the college man. Conse- 
quently, he does not know how to estimate his fitness for 
them. He cannot advise to any extent with his father, 
because he represents only one vocation. Neither can 
he advise advantageously with his instructor for he, 
too, is familiar with the nature of only one profession. 
For this reason, a series of books, dealing with the 
leading vocations, and prepared by men of large ability 
and experience, capable of giving wise counsel, is a 
desideratwm. Such men are competent to explain the 
nature and divisions of the particular vocations which 
they represent, the personal and educational qualifica- 
tions necessary for a successful pursuit of the same, 
the advantages and disadvantages, the difficulties and 
temptations, the opportunities and ideals ; thus, in an 
adequate way, enabling the student to estimate his own 
fitness for them. They are also able to make valuable 
suggestions relating to the man's work after he enters 
upon his vocation. 



X EDITOR S PEOSPECTUS 

Fortunately, in the present Series, the Editor has 
been able to secure the services of some of the most 
eminent experts in the country to prepare the respec- 
tive volumes — men of large knowledge and experi- 
ence, who have attained wide recognition and genuine 
success in their " callings." It is a pleasure to be 
able to place at the command of the many thousands 
of students in our American colleges the wise counsel 
of such experienced and distinguished men. 

The "Vocational Series" will consist of twelve books 
written by representatives of different vocations, as fol- 
low: 

1. The Young Man and the Law 

Hon. Simeon E. Baldwin, LL.D., Professor of Law, 
Emeritus, Yale University, ex-Governor and ex- 
Chief Justice of Connecticut 

2. The Young Man and the Ministry 

Rev. Charles R. Brown, D.D., LL.D., Dean of the 
School of Religion, Yale University 

3. The Young Man and Teaching 

Professor Henry Parks Wright, Ph.D., LL.D., Pro- 
fessor Emeritus and formerly Dean of Yale College 

4. The Young Man and Medicine 

Lewellys F. Barker, M.D., LL.D., Professor of 
Medicine and Chief Physician, Johns-Hopkins Uni- 
versity 

5. The Young Man and Journalism 

Chester Sanders Lord, M.A., LL.D., formerly Man- 
aging Editor New York Sun 



EDITOR S PROSPECTUS XI 

6. The Young Man and Banking 

Hon. Frank A. Vanderlip, M.A., LL.D., President 
of the City National Bank, New York 

7. The Young Man and Business 

8. The Young Man and Mechanical Engineering 

Lester P. Breckenridge, M.A., Eng.D., Professor of 
Mechanical Engineering, Sheffield Scientific School, 
Yale University 

9. The Young Man and Electrical Engineering 

Charles F. Scott, Sc.D., Eng.D., Professor of Elec- 
trical Engineering, Sheffield Scientific School, Yale 
University 

10. The Young Man and Civil Engineering 

George F. Swain, LL.D., Professor of Civil Engi- 
neering, Harvard University 

11. The Young Man and Farming 

L. H. Bailey, M.S., LL.D., formerly Director of 
College of Agriculture, Cornell University, and Ed- 
itor of Cyclopedia of American Horticulture, Rural 
Science Series, Garden Craft Series, Rural Text- 
Book Series, Cyclopedia of Agriculture, etc. 

12. The Young Man and Government Service 

Hon. WilUam Howard Taft, D.C.L., LL.D., ex- 
President of the United States, and Chief Justice 
of the United States Supreme Court 

E. Hershey Sneath. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

CHAPTER rAOB 

I Historical Introduction 1 

II Branches of Civil Engineering .... 27 

(a) Surveying, Topographical Engineering and 

Geodesy 

(b) Railroad Engineering 

(c) Highway Engineering 

(d) Hydraulic Engineering 

(e) Sanitary Engineering 

(f) Structural Engineering 

(g) Municipal Engineering 
(h) Valuation of Properties 

III Qualifications Necessary or Desirable for 

THE Civil Engineer 90 

IV The Education of the Civil Engineer . . 113 

V Characteristics of Civil Engineering as a 

Profession 153 

VI The Outlook for the Civil Engineer . . 177 

VII Concluding Suggestions 188 



THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL 
ENGINEERING 



CHAPTER I 
INTRODUCTION 

The field of engineering is so large, and its extent 
and limitations so little understood by the layman, 
that it is necessary at the outset to consider briefly 
the history of engineering and of the development of 
its various branches, in order that the reader may 
clearly perceive the proper meaning of the term "en- 
gineering," as well as of the narrower terms "civil en- 
gineering," "mechanical engineering," etc. 

Engineering may perhaps- be most briefly and at the 
same time most broadly described as the science and 
art of construction. Whoever constructs a thing, 
whether it be a bridge, a railroad, a steam engine, or 
a watch, is in the broadest sense an engineer. But 
there are obvious limitations and extensions of this 
definition, and these, as we shall see, lead to a more 
accurate definition. Engineering involves not merely 
manual or mechanical skill, but intelligent application 
of the laws of nature. Something more is required 

1 



2 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

than mechanical proficiency in the use of tools or 
materials. The man who runs the engines in a mill, 
or the workman who fashions the parts of a locomotive, 
is not an engineer in the true sense. A knowledge of 
the reasons why certain mechanical operations have to 
be performed, and an intelligent adaptation of the laws 
of nature to the attainment of those ends, is necessary, 
and this involves the distinction between an art and a 
science. 

A science teaches us to know and an art to do. A sci- 
entific man studies the reasons for things, investigates 
the laws of nature, and designs the means of adapting 
them to the end in view. The merely mechanical rou- 
tine work of performing the operations necessary for 
the production or construction of the object or agency 
desired, is not engineering. A skilled mechanic, there- 
fore, is not an engineer ; neither is a skillful roadmaster 
of a railroad, though he superintends the laying and 
maintenance of the track ; unless these men, in addition 
to being skilled in doing, are also skilled in knowing, 
so that they understand the reason why, and can adapt 
means to ends ; modifying, if need be, their usual prac- 
tice to meet particular emergencies. 

In a similar manner, the scientist who, in the solitude 
of his study or laboratory, investigates the laws of 
nature, and perhaps discovers new ones, is not neces- 
sarily an engineer, unless he has the capacity of also 
showing how his discoveries may be made useful, though 
perhaps he may not himself have the mechanical skill 
necessary to put them into actual use, or to fashion 



INTRODUCTION 3 

the tools or instruments necessary for that purpose. 
An art, therefore, is, or should be, founded upon a 
science, the science teaching what to do, how to do it, 
and why, while the art develops the specific means of 
accomplishment. 

Engineering is, therefore, both a science and an art. 
The engineer must know and must also be able to do. 
The important thing is the knowing, or the science. 
The engineer may not actually do a great deal with 
his hands, but he must at least know how to do it, 
should it be necessary; and, strictly speaking, he is 
not an engineer unless he is engaged to some extent in 
actually doing, whether with his own hands or by 
directing the hands of others. In a similar manner, the 
mechanic who is skillful with his hands, if he also knows 
the scientific principles governing the things which he 
does, and is able to coordinate intelligently the science 
and the art, may not be denied the title of engineer, 
provided he actually does use science and is not merely 
a workman, even a skillful one. The work of the engi- 
neer, therefore, involves the command and use of prin- 
ciples, and the ability to apply them in a way which 
will lead to the definite construction of some work. The 
engineer is not a mere mechanic or workman, though a 
mechanic or workman may well have the capacity to 
become an engineer if opportunity is offered. 

What we know as the "learned professions" are those 
in which brain work is necessary and not merely skill. 
Engineering, therefore, should rightly be considered as 
one of the learned professions and not merely an art, 



4 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

since it requires for its exercise a knowledge of the 
laws of nature, and their application. 

The profession of engineering is as ancient as any 
of the occupations of man. No doubt from the earliest 
times man has been subject to disease, and the healing 
art in more or less crude or imaginary form has long 
been practiced; man, naturally a quarrelsome animal, 
has also from the earliest time engaged in disputes with 
his neighbor, and in more or less imperfect form, the 
law has long had to be administered. Once more, from 
the most primitive times, man has realized the presence 
of some supernatural power which the priest, if only 
under the title of "medicine man," has endeavored to 
propitiate. But clearly, man has always required water 
and food, and has dug wells and employed crude means 
for raising water and for growing crops. He has also 
in the earliest stages of civilization required some sort 
of shelter and made use of some of the laws of nature 
for purposes of offense and defense, and for the fashion- 
ing of weapons, tools, and implements, even before the 
principles of law were formulated and perhaps before 
anything was known or even imagined with reference 
to the healing art; so that the engineer and architect 
(who so far as his work is constructive and not wholly 
artistic is also an engineer) may fairly claim that their 
profession is as old as any. 

In the Lake Dwellers' village of Wangen, in Switzer- 
land, fifty thousand piles are said to have been driven 
into the bed of the lake, to support the dwellings. This 
was in the Late Stone Age, between 10,000 and 3,000 



INTRODUCTION 5 

years B. C. In Egypt, the pyramids were built about 
2,900 years B. C, and great mechanical skill must have 
been possessed by the builders in quarrying, transport- 
ing, and raising the immense blocks of stone that were 
used. Buckle, quoting from Diodorus, says that "to 
build one of the pyramids required the labour of 360,- 
000 men for 20 years," and that 2,000 men were occu- 
pied for three years in carrying a single stone from 
Elephantine to Sais. A little later, but fully 4,000 
years ago, the Egyptians anticipated the construction 
of the Suez Canal by building a canal from the head of 
the Red Sea or Gulf of Suez westward to the eastern- 
most branch of the Nile, so that vessels of that time 
could pass from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea by 
this route ; and this work is said by Buckle to have cost 
the lives of 120,000 Egyptians. Thus early were ac- 
complished engineering works which to-day would be 
called great, though done with a prodigal waste of 
human life and labor. The wonder is, however, that 
they could have been accomplished at all, . considering 
the primitive state of scientific knowledge. 

Many people, even those well informed, appear to 
have the idea that engineering is not a profession in the 
proper sense of the term, and that the engineer is 
neither a scientist nor professional man, nor yet a busi- 
ness man, strictly speaking, but that he is something 
betwixt and between, perhaps more nearly a mechanic. 
According to the dictionary, a profession is defined as 
"A vocation in which a professed knowledge of some 
department of science or learning is used by its practi- 



6 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

cal application to the affairs of others, either in ad- 
vising, guiding, or teaching them, or in serving their 
interests or welfare in the practice of an art founded 
on it. Formerly, theology, law, and medicine, were 
specifically known as the professions; but as the appli- 
cations of science and learning are extended to other 
departments of affairs, other vocations also received 
the name. The word implies professed attainments in 
special knowledge, as distinguished from mere skill; a 
practical dealing with affairs, as distinguished from 
mere study or investigation; and the application of 
such knowledge to the uses of others as a vocation, as 
distinguished from its pursuit for one's own purposes." 
According to this definition engineering is clearly both 
a science and an art. 

Up to the present time the art involved in the work 
of engineering has probably been more recognized than 
the science. The engineer has been considered rather a 
builder than a scientific man, pursuing an occupation 
or avocation, rather than a profession. As civilization 
developed, the work of the engineer and builder de- 
veloped correspondingly. The Assyrians and Baby- 
lonians built canals and bridges; the inhabitants of 
India, great reservoirs ; the Egyptians, pyramids ; the 
Romans, roads, bridges, aqueducts, baths, and other 
important works, many of them of great extent, and 
requiring unusual skill. The builders of these works 
were engineers. 

During the early development of the profession, en- 
gineering came to be divided into two kinds, civil and 



INTRODUCTION 7 

military; the latter being concerned with the construc- 
tion of fortifications, and with all other means of de- 
fense and offense; while civil engineering included all 
other applications of the constructive art. The uncer- 
tainties, however, with regard to the precise meaning 
of the term civil engineering, and the desirability of 
having it accurately defined, led the Council of the 
Institution of Civil Engineers of Great Britain on De- 
cember 29, 1827, to pass the following resolve : 

"RESOLVED, That Mr. Tredgold be written to, re- 
questing him to define the objects of the Institution of 
Civil Engineers.* and to give a description of what a civil 
engineer is, in order that this description and these ob- 
jects may be embodied in a petition to the Attorney Gen- 
eral in application for a charter." 

At the following meeting of the Council on January 
4, 1828, a communication from Mr. Tredgold was 
read and entered in the Minutes, bearing the title 
"Description of a Civil Engineer, by Thomas Tredgold, 
Hon. M. Inst. C.E.," as a result of which the charter of 
the Institution described the profession of the civil 
engineer as "the art of directing the great sources of 
power in nature for the use and convenience of man, 
as the means of production and of traffic in states both 
for external and internal trade, as applied in the con- 
struction of roads, bridges, aqueducts, canals, river 
navigation, and docks, for internal intercourse and ex- 

* The Institution of Civil Engineers of Great Britain was 
founded in 1818, and incorporated by Royal Charter in 1828; 
the Institution of Mechanical Engineers was formed nineteen 
years later, with George Stephenson as the first President. 



8 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEEEING 

change; and in the construction of ports, harbors, 
moles, breakwaters and light houses ; and in the art of 
navigation by artificial power for the purposes of 
commerce, and in the construction and adaptation of 
machinery, and in the drainage of cities and towns." 

Tredgold's definition of Civil Engineering as "the 
art of directing the great sources of power in nature 
for the use and convenience of man," is the definition 
still generally given. It is suggestive in various ways ; 
it emphasizes, as has been done on a previous page, that 
engineering properly involves the application of the 
laws of nature. It also involves a concrete application 
of those laws "for the use and convenience of man" 
and not merely for abstract or useless purposes. It 
may be criticized, however, in defining engineering as 
an art. It would perhaps be proper to consider engi- 
neering to be an art founded upon some branch or 
branches of science, such as the science of mechanics 
or of physics or of chemistry, but the art and the sci- 
ence cannot always be clearly differentiated; it is not 
easy to tell where the science ends and the art begins. 
If we adhere strictly to the conception that engineering 
is an art and therefore limited strictly to the doing, 
this would lead us to conclude that a man is only an 
engineer when he is executing the work, and that while 
he is designing it or studying the principles governing 
its design, he is .a scientist. It seems more proper to 
consider engineering as both a science and an art, and 
not simply as an art depending upon a science. 

Furthermore, engineering is concerned not only with 



INTRODUCTION 9 

directing the sources of power in nature, but in utiliz- 
ing and applying all the laws of nature and all the 
materials of the external world. Tredgold's definition 
was formulated at a time when the minds of engineers 
were filled with the new discoveries relating to power, 
which will hereafter be briefly referred to — with the 
steam engine, the steam boat, and the steam locomotive. 
The subject of power was, therefore, foremost in men's 
minds, and it is natural that this should have been 
emphasized in the definition. 

Recently, the late Mr. Henry G. Stott, in his address 
as President of the American Institute of Electrical 
Engineers, proposed as an improvement upon Tred- 
gold's definition, the following: 

"Engineering is the art of organizing and directing men, 
and of controlling the forces and materials of nature for 
the benefit of the human race." 

This definition, however, is also incomplete in that 
it terms engineering an art. Furthermore, it would ap- 
ply the term to any activity in organizing and directing 
men, such for instance, as in military or political 
operations, and while this use of the term is often sug- 
gested, as when we speak of "engineering a deal," such 
use is a corruption or slang expression. Furthermore, 
neither of the definitions quoted puts any emphasis on 
one of the most important functions of engineering, 
namely, the regard for economy. The organizing and 
directing of men does not seem to be properly engineer- 
ing, though we may sometimes refer to it as such; nor 
should a clumsy and wasteful and useless application 



10 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

of the laws of nature be termed engineering, though 
perhaps we should recognize it as simply bad engineer- 
ing. A man, who by no stretch of the imagination could 
be called an engineer, migiit, if he were given sufficient 
time, men, and money, construct works similar to or 
identical with some of those built by engineers. It is, 
of course, plain there will always be differences of effi- 
ciency between engineers, and both good and bad en- 
gineering, and yet it would seem that some emphasis 
should be laid upon economy. Indeed, an engineer has 
been wittily defined as a man who does with one dollar 
what any fool can do with two, 

James Nasmyth, the great English engineer and 
inventor, defined engineering as "common sense applied 
to the use of materials." 

In view of the above considerations the following 
definition is suggested, namely : 

Engineering is the science and art of applying, eco- 
nomically, the laws, forces, and materials of nature, for 
the use, convenience, or enjoyment of man. 

The proper practice of engineering clearly requires 
both knowing and doing, and it is this combination, to- 
gether with the character of the work done by the 
engineer, that leads to the somewhat peculiar position 
of the profession. It is not, of course, an art in the 
sense of being one of the fine arts. The engineer, as 
such, has little or nothing to do with questions of 
beauty, although every member of the profession should 
aim to possess such knowledge of the canons of beauty 
as to lead him to construct works which are not only 



INTRODUCTION 11 

useful, but beautiful as well, with due regard to 
economy. The engineer must know the laws and forces 
of nature and the properties of materials, and must be 
able to apply them economically. The laws and forces 
of nature with which he must be familiar, will depend 
upon the specific branch of the profession which he 
practices. Tredgold, after giving his definition of civil 
engineering, in which he specified many branches of 
the profession, concluded with the prediction that the 
extent of the profession was "limited only by the 
progress of science, and that its scope and utility would 
be increased with every discovery in philosophy, and 
its resources with every invention of the mechanical or 
chemical arts, since its bounds are unlimited and equally 
so must be the resources of its professors." 

This prediction has been abundantly justified. Since 
Tredgold's time great fields, then unsuspected, have 
been added to the profession of engineering, resulting 
in the development, from the original root of civil en- 
gineering, of numerous branches, each of which is now a 
profession by itself. A knowledge of these develop- 
ments, as well as of some which took place even before 
Tredgold's definition was formulated, is essential in 
order that the reader may clearly see the relation of 
civil engineering to other branches of the profession. 

Up to nearly the end of the eighteenth century the 
sources of power in nature were little understood and 
could be utilized only to a comparatively small degree. 
Up to that time engineering comprised mainly the con- 
struction of roads, canals and bridges, the improvement 



12 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

of harbors, river works, the construction of docks, and 
the supplying of towns and cities with water. The 
state of the art only allowed of the construction of 
bridges of very short span, either of stone or wood, 
since iron had not yet been brought into use, and ferries 
were generally employed in crossing streams too deep 
for fording. The steam engine was known only in a 
very crude and uneconomical form; the weaving of 
cloth was almost all done by hand; there was little 
transportation except by sea; cities were not drained, 
or lighted by gas ; the applications of electricity were, 
of course, unknown; navigation by water was entirely 
by means of sailing vessels or with oars ; and the only 
form in which iron was used to any large extent was 
in the form of cast iron. 

But before the end of the eighteenth century there 
came a remarkable series of mechanical inventions — the 
spinning jenny by Hargreaves, the spinning frame by 
Arkwright, the mule by Crompton, the power loom by 
Cartwright, the modern steam engine by Watt, the 
puddling process for making wrought iron by Cort, and 
others. These were followed, in the first third of the 
eighteenth century, by the development of the steam 
locomotive by Stephenson, of the steamboat by Fulton, 
by the inauguration of the era of railroads, beginning 
for all practical purposes with the victory of the 
"Rocket" in the competition at Rainhill in 1829, and 
by further great improvements in manufacturing, and 
in the production of iron and steel. 

It was just at this time, when the minds of all were 



INTEODUCTION 13 

filled with the inventions of Watt and of Stephenson, 
that Tredgold gave his definition, clearly showing the 
tremendous influence held at that time by the subject 
of power., These great developments much enlarged 
the field of engineering, and gave birth to a new class of 
engineer — the railroad engineer. They led also to the 
differentiation of the mechanical engineer from the civil 
engineer. Since that time the mechanical engineer has 
claimed as his special field the development and use 
of power in all its forms, including the generation 
of power from the combustion of fuel or the flow of 
water, by means of the various types of engines and 
water wheels, the transmission of that power from point 
to point by belting, shafting or other means, and the 
utilization of that power by machinery. There is 
hardly a field of human industry, therefore, which is 
not dependent upon the mechanical engineer, because 
all manufactured articles depend upon power in some 
application, and upon machinery operated by power. 

The field of the modern mechanical engineer, however, 
not only covers the department of power and its appli- 
cations — in manufacturing, in the steam locomotive, in 
the steamship — but it is also held to include the con- 
struction of mills, and all applications of steam 
and heat such as heating, ventilation, lighting, and so 
on. 

But notwithstanding the diff*erentiation from it of 
the field of the mechanical engineer, the field of the 
civil engineer was itself enlarged by the progress of 
science and invention. The great impetus given to 



14 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

manufacturing rendered necessary the distribution of 
the raw material and of the manufactured products. 
Transportation engineering was enormously increased 
in its scope and the new profession of the railroad 
(civil) engineer was brought into existence. Roads, rail' 
roads, canals, harbors and docks, were built with unex- 
ampled rapidity, and river improvements were exten- 
sively carried on. At this time the increasing use of 
canals gave occasion for the celebrated remark of 
Brindley, the great canal engineer of England, himself 
an untutored genius, who, when asked what the use of a 
river was, replied "to supply canals with water." At 
the same time the economical production of wrought 
iron rendered possible the construction of bridges of 
considerable span. 

By this time had begun one of the greatest socio- 
logical movements which characterizes the present time, 
namely, the increasing congregation of people in cities. 
At the beginning of the nineteenth century only three 
per cent, of the population of the United States lived in 
cities, while at the present time the urban population 
is over fifty per cent, of the total. This phenomenon, 
during the last half of the century just passed, has led 
to the differentiation of another field of engineering, 
namely, that of the sanitary engineer, whose specific 
province it is to deal with the problems of water supply, 
drainage, the disposal of refuse, the purification of 
water and sewage, the sanitation of dwellings, and the 
various other problems resulting from this congestion 
of population. 



INTRODUCTION 15 

Improvements, also, in chemistry and in metallurgy, 
have given rise to still other distinct branches of engi- 
neering, namely, mining engineering and metallurgy, the 
scope of which it is not necessary here to sketch. 

Again, the field of the mechanical engineer has during 
the past quarter of a century become subdivided, owing 
to the discoveries in electricity. Steam and water are 
no longer used simply to propel steam engines or water 
wheels, producing power to be used on the spot. Steam 
or other engines, and water wheels, now drive electric 
generators, the currents from which are transmitted 
long distances, sometimes as great as 200 or even 300 
miles, by means of transmission wires, to be again 
transformed by electric motors and used for the pro- 
duction of light or for the operation of machinery. 
The telephone and the telegraph have been discovered, 
electric cars have replaced the horse cars, and the 
traffic of our steam railroads is in 'some cases being 
hauled by electric locomotives. Almost everything 
nowadays is done or can he done by electricity, even 
to preparing our food, washing our clothes and dishes, 
and heating our houses. The electrical engineer, with 
a field already so wide that it is divided into specialties, 
is a product of the last twenty-five years. 

By the last third of the nineteenth century, there- 
fore, there had grown out from the original stem of civil 
engineering, three professions so differentiated from 
it and from each other, that they have ever since been 
and are still regarded as separate professions, namely: 
(1) Mechanical engineering, (2) electrical engineer- 



16 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

ing, (3) mining' engineering and metallurgy. A fourth 
stem, namely, architecture, may be said to have been 
differentiated from civil engineering at a still earlier 
date. 

These five professions are represented by the five 
great national engineering societies in the United 
States, namely : 

(1) The American Society of Civil Engineers (Insti- 
tuted Nov. 5, 1852). 

(2) The American Society of Mechanical Engineers 
(Organized 1880^ Incorporated 1881). 

(3) The American Institute of Electrical Engineers 
(Organized 1884^ Incorporated 1895), 

(4) The American Institute of Mining Engineers (Or- 
ganized 1871). 

(5) The American Institute of Architects (Incorpo- 
rated 1857). 

These professions have many points of contact and 
cannot be sharply differentiated from each other. 
There are overlapping or twilight zones which may be 
considered to belong to either of two or more. In the 
last analysis, members of all these professions belong 
to the one great profession of engineering, but for 
practical purposes it is desirable and usual to consider 
them as distinct. Indeed, each of these professions has, 
with the development of science, become divided into 
a number of specialties. This is particularly true of 
civil engineering for, notwithstanding the differentia- 
tion from it of the fields of architecture, mechanical 
engineering, electrical engineering, mining engineer- 
ing and metallurgy, the field of the civil engineer keeps 



INTRODUCTION 17 

on ever increasing in scope. Coasts have to be pro- 
tected from the sea, swamp and marsh lands reclaimed, 
large areas irrigated by artificial means, requiring the 
construction of great dams, the storing of immense 
quantities of water and the distribution of that water 
by means of canals into the uplands. Novel problems 
of urban transportation present themselves and must 
be solved by the construction of subways and tunnels ; 
great railroad terminals have to be provided ; and tow- 
ering sky-scrapers are constructed by the engineer, 
who here trenches upon the domain of the architect. 
Also the possibility of electrical transmission, and the 
increasing scarcity and waste of fuel, have increased 
enormously the importance and value of water powers. 
The question of the discharge of rivers, the means of in- 
creasing it, of storing it so as to make it more regular 
from month to month, thus avoiding the damage due 
to floods, and increasing the power during dry seasons, 
the construction of dams and of the various works 
incident to the development of water powers, all these, 
together with other problems, now constitute a separate 
field, that of the hydraulic engineer. Water, at once 
the most valuable and necessary of the gifts of nature, 
and at the same time an enemy to be dreaded and feared, 
must be controlled and governed, so that communities 
may be supplied adequately with this necessity of life 
and the power generated by the rivers turned to the 
service of man. The laws of water flowing in conduits, 
through pipes and in open channels must be studied 
and experimented upon, and the science of the laws of 



18 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

water — ^hydraulics — is steadily increasing in value and 
in importance. 

Of recent years, in addition to the five main branches 
of the profession of engineering above enumerated, 
others may fairly be said to have been developed. The 
increase in transportation by sea, the use of steel 
ships, and the ever increasing size of vessels, has led 
to the profession of the naval architect, itself a large 
field, dealing with the applications of steel and other 
materials to the construction of vessels. Another 
specialty of mechanical engineering is that of the 
marine engineer. The naval architect builds the vessels, 
the marine engineer equips them with machinery and 
provides them with ventilating and other apparatus 
necessary to fit them for use. Still another branch or 
specialty of mechanical engineering has been developed 
by the construction of large and high buildings, namely, 
the profession of the heating and ventilating engineers, 
which deals with the methods and means of heating and 
ventilating buildings of all kinds. Indeed, the architect 
may be said to produce the mere shell of a great build- 
ing. The equipping it with machinery and apparatus 
for heating and ventilating, with elevators, water sup- 
plies, plumbing, and fire protection, is a large problem 
in itself, and belongs to engineering rather than to 
architecture. 

Finally, investigations in the various fields of applied 
chemistry, as for instance in the production of gas and 
oil, in the manufacture of rubber goods, soap, glue 
and other materials too numerous to mention, have 



INTRODUCTION 19 

led in recent years to the formation of still another 
branch of the profession, namely, that of chemical 
engineering, which deals with the application of chem- 
istry to the useful arts. To even enumerate the appli- 
cations of this science would tax the patience of the 
reader. 

From the above brief sketch it will appear that civil 
engineering is the parent stem which at first included all 
branches of the constructive art, with the exception 
of military engineering, which may perhaps be con- 
sidered to be, in its objects, more destructive than con- 
structive; that from this parent stem four to six new 
branches may be said to have grown, which now consti- 
tute professions in themselves and»are not the subject 
of further consideration, except incidentally, in this 
book. What remains in the field of civil engineering 
is, however, even now much larger than it was in Tred- 
gold^s time, and it is continually growing as new ap- 
plications of science are discovered and new lines of 
practice are founded upon them. 

In its restricted meaning, civil engineering may be 
said to include the following branches, although some 
of these specialties may be claimed to be entitled to 
rank as separate professions : 

(1) Surveying and Geodesy, which deals with the 
measurement and dehneation of large or small portions of 
the earth's surface and the objects found thereon. 

(2) Hailroad Engineering, which deals with the lo- 
cation and construction of railways, and their maintenance 
and operation so far as engineering principles are con- 
cerned. 



20 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

(3) Highway Engineering, which deals with the loca- 
tion, construction and maintenance of highways, including 
city streets and pavements. 

(4) Hydraulic Engineering, which deals with the laws 
governing the flow of water in all kinds o£ channels, and 
with the principles governing the flow of water upon the 
surface of the earth, both in surface and underground 
channels; with the discharge of rivers, the methods of con- 
trolling it and of protecting banks and preserving navi- 
gable channels; with the location and construction of dams 
and their appurtenances, for retaining bodies of water, for 
the water supply of communities and for the production of 
power; with the construction of canals, harbors, light 
houses and other works in which the control of water is the 
main problem. This branch of the subject includes what 
is known as canal, river, and harbor engineering, water 
power engineering, irrigation engineering, and water-sup- 
ply engineering. 

(5) Sanitary Engineering, which deals with problems 
relating to the protection and preservation of the health 
of communities, involving many aspects of water supply 
engineering; the sanitation of dwellings and other build- 
ings; the sewerage of cities and towns; the drainage of 
land; the disposal of sewage, refuse, garbage; and in gen- 
eral with works for the preservation of the public health. 

(6) Structural Engineering, which finds its applica- 
tion in all of the other branches, and which deals with the 
details of design and construction of fixed structures of 
all kinds, and their foiindations, such as bridges, roofs, 
buildings, dams, retaining walls, tunnels, subways, and 
many other types of fixed structures. 

To these may be added municipal engineering, which 
is a combination of several of the above; and the newer 
branch of valuation of properties. 

Having attempted to give some idea of what civil 
engineering is, it is desirable to call attention to what 



INTRODUCTION 21 

it is not. The word engineering is often used very 
vaguely and is made to include occupations which 
should be designated by another title. The man who 
runs a locomotive, or who superintends a stationary 
engine plant, is frequently termed an engineer, though 
seldom a civil engineer. Strictly speaking, this desig- 
nation is a misnomer. Such a man should be termed 
an engine-man, for while it is undoubtedly true that 
many men of this class have acute common sense and 
thorough knowledge of the machinery entrusted to their 
charge, both as regards its construction and its opera- 
tion, so that they may be in fact intellectually and tech- 
nically superior to many men who claim the title of 
engineer, yet there should be a distinction made between 
the man whose business it is to design as well as to 
construct, who understands the science as well as the 
art, and the man whose occupation it is simply to 
superintend the running of a machine or a plant. 
Similarly, a plumber sometimes styles himself a sani- 
tary engineer, although his work is purely mechanical 
and concerned with the fitting together of the various 
pieces of apparatus which are involved in the plumbing 
or water supply of a building, and he may be entirely 
ignorant of the scientific principles involved, and en- 
tirely incapable of designing the plant which he puts 
together. 

The lines of demarcation between the above branches 
of the profession are more or less indefinite and in- 
distinct, as wiU be fully pointed out in later pages, just 



22 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEEEING 

as the line of demarcation between civil engineering and 
mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, archi- 
tecture, or even economics, is more or less indistinct. 

A little reflection upon the foregoing review will 
make clear the enormous extent of the field of engineer- 
ing as a profession, and even of what is still left as prop- 
erly comprised in the province of civil engineering; 
and will probably justify the statement that this field 
is more extensive than that of any of the three profes- 
sions which from time immemorial have been known as 
the learned professions. The different branches of the 
engineering profession differ from each other to such 
an extent that in some cases they have little in common, 
except a knowledge of the general principles of physics, 
chemistry, mechanics, or other sciences. The profes- 
sion of the physician, it is true, is divided into many 
specialties, but while the throat specialist deals with 
the throat, the heart specialist with the heart, and 
the stomach specialist with the stomach, they are all 
dealing with the human body, in which all parts and 
functions are closely interconnected. The lawyer, too, 
no matter which of the many specialties of the profes- 
sion he pursues, is always dealing with the law and its 
administration. But even within the narrower field of 
civil engineering, the railroad engineer and the irriga- 
tion engineer, or the railroad engineer and the achitec- 
tural engineer, deal with the application of entirely 
different laws of nature and their work may have little 
in common. Assuredly, Tredgold was right when he 
said that the bounds of the profession are unlimited. 



INTRODUCTION 23 

Attention has been called to the fact that, as civiliza- 
tion advances, the various branches of engineering 
developed, resulting in the differentiation of many 
specialties. It may, however, be fairly claimed that 
the development of engineering was not a result of the 
advance of civilization, but the principal cause of it. 
There has been much discussion by historians and so- 
ciologists as to the causes of the progress of civiliza- 
tion, and whether it has been due mainly to moral or to 
material advances. Those who are accustomed to look 
always at the moral aspect of phenomena, and who con- 
trast the improved attitude toward moral questions 
which exists in general to-day, as compared with past 
centuries, are apt to believe that moral progress has 
been the main element in the progress of civilization; 
but when it is rememberd that in the teachings of the 
ancient Greeks, Romans and other peoples there may 
be found laid down as high standards of morality as 
those that are now recognized; that the moral teach- 
ings of the religions of the world to-day had their 
origins centuries ago ; that human nature to-day, not- 
withstanding all these moral teachings, remains essen- 
tially the same as it has always been ; and that in fact 
moral standards necessarily vary according to circum- 
stances, such as time and place; it will probably be 
perceived that what we call progress in civilization 
has been mainly due to the advances in the applications 
of the laws of nature, that is, to the work of the en- 
gineer, and that any improvement in moral standards 
and ideals follows as a result of these advances. 



24 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

No profession is, therefore, more important for the 
welfare of the human race than engineering, not even 
that of medicine, which has done so much for the alle- 
viation of the physical suffering of mankind. None 
has done more to promote the well-being and to advance 
the best interests, material and moral, of the human 
family. Preeminent among the agencies which have 
been developed by the engineer and which have operated 
for this advancement, are the invention of the printing 
press and of the telegraph and the telephone, which 
provide the means of the registration, communication, 
and transmission of ideas ; the development of transpor- 
tation, by railroad, highway and steamship; and the 
various developments in manufacturing and industry 
which make possible the economic production of the 
fruits of the earth and the materials of mines and quar- 
ries, and their fashioning into forms serviceable for the 
use of man. It is these inventions and developments 
which have quickened the moral tone of mankind and 
led to such moral improvement as may have been 
achieved. They have made the whole world kin. An 
occurrence in almost any part of the world may now be 
made known everywhere within a few hours. The prod- 
ucts of one land are spread broadcast. No nation is 
now isolated, but not only is it commercially in touch 
with the whole world, but its acts, good or bad, are 
quickly known, and arouse moral approbation or in- 
dignation, as the case may be. 

The engineer is, therefore, the true civilizer of man- 
kind or the advance agent of civilization. If all that he 



INTRODUCTION 25 

has accomplished in the last few centuries could be 
wiped out, what would remain of our civilization? 
That progress is primarily due to material and not to 
moral causes, is evident from the fact that even the 
advances due to the applied scientist do not prevent 
the commission of grievous crimes, but are even seized 
upon and made to serve in this twentieth century, in 
the perpetuation, by so-called civilized nations, of as 
great crimes as the history of the world can show. 

A good illustration of the development of the en- 
gineering profession is found in the history of the 
noted French corps of government engineers known 
as the Corps des Fonts et Chaussees. It was in the 
time of Charles V that professional engineers were 
first employed by the king to supervise public works, 
particularly roads, which were known as the king's 
highways. The corps experienced many vicissitudes, 
some rulers appreciating their work while others did 
not. In the time of Louis XIV, the engineers were 
pushed into the background, the king reserving his 
favor for the court architects. The architect. Man- 
sard, was entrusted with the building of a bridge across 
the Allier at Moulins, but he was unacquainted with 
the principles of hydraulics, could not calculate the 
volume and force of the water, and did not know how 
to protect his bridge against floods, so that it collapsed 
a few years later. This disaster was favorable to the 
engineers, who pointed out that while it was the duty 
of architects to build fine palaces, engineers should be 
entrusted with the construction of public works where 



26 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

convenience and stability were of more importance 
than elegance. The Corps des Fonts et Chaussees was 
definitely and permanently organized between 1712 
and 1716; and under Louis XV the noted Ecole des 
Fonts et Chassees was constituted by royal decree 
dated February 14, 1747. It was placed under the 
direction of the engineer, Ferronet, who besides other 
great works had built the beautiful Font de la Concorde 
at Faris. At the beginning of the French Revolution, 
it was proposed to abolish the corps, but this move 
was defeated by Mirabeau, and instead the corps was 
reorganized by several decrees. The corps is now 
under the Department of Fublic Works. Five-sixths of 
its engineers come from the Ecole des Fonts et Chaus- 
sees, while one-sixth come from foremen, who, after ten 
years* experience, are entitled to enter a competitive 
examination and if successful may be appointed en- 
gineers. 

Ferronet remained director of the school for 47 
years after it was founded in 1747. He died February 
27, 1794. The following year the Ecole Folytechnique 
was founded, giving a general scientific training pre- 
paratory to the engineering school. The course in the 
engineering school extends over three years, offering 
free tuition in all courses, and state pupils are chosen 
exclusively from those leaving the Ecole Folytechnique 
and receive a salary during their stay in Faris. Dur- 
ing each vacation they are required to spend three 
and one-half months in practical work under the super- 
vision of one of the engineers of the corps. 



CHAPTER II 

BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 

In the previous chapter the development of the 
various branches of engineering was discussed, and the 
general field of civil engineering indicated. It should 
be remarked that by some the field of civil engineering 
is still considered to include all branches of engineering, 
with the exception of military engineering. In Eng- 
land, the "Institution of Civil Engineers'* includes 
practitioners in all branches, and its discussions cover 
subjects in mechanical engineering, electrical engineer- 
ing, naval architecture, etc., perhaps to an almost 
equal degree with civil engineering in its more restricted 
sense. Nevertheless, it seems proper at this stage of 
the development of the engineering profession, to re- 
strict the field of civil engineering. In the present 
chapter the various branches constituting civil en- 
gineering in this restricted sense will be discussed, and 
their extent and the character of the problems which 
they offer will be pointed out. These fields, according 
to the enumeration already given, are the following: 

(1) Surveying and Geodesy 

(2) Railroad Engineering 

(3) Highway Engineering 

(4) Hydraulic Engineering 

27 



28 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

(5) Sanitary Engineering 

(6) Structural Engineering 

(7) Municipal Engineering 

To these may be added the consideration of certain 
branches which involve the relations between engineer- 
ing and various economical and sociological problems, 
which are now attracting considerable attention, such 
as valuation and city planning. 

1. Surveymg and Geodesy 

Since engineering deals with works executed on the 
surface of the earth, which works must be designed, 
laid out, and constructed, it is clear that at its founda- 
tion must lie the ability to measure and delineate cer- 
tain portions of the earth's surface; in other words, to 
make a survey and to represent the results upon a map. 

Surveying is one of the first steps in any engineering 
project. If a building is to be built, an accurate sur- 
vey must be made of the land upon which it is to be 
placed. The map showing the result of this survey, 
should indicate all necessary measurements and should 
show the relative elevation of different portions of the 
area, and if necessary, the character of the surface and 
of the objects upon it. The architect can then plan the 
location and elevation of his building, and the engineer 
can set the necessary stakes and lines preliminary to 
the beginning of the work of construction. Surveying 
involves, therefore, the measurement of areas supposed 
to be projected upon a flat surface, also the mxasure- 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 29 

ment of elevations. The notes of these measurements 
are plotted upon a map with the degree of detail which 
the conditions require. 

A similar procedure must be followed if a bridge is 
to be built, in order that the abutments and piers may 
be located in precisely the desired places, and accurate 
dimensions obtained for their design and that of the 
superstructure. If the bridge is to cross a river, direct 
measurements of the length may not be possible, and 
measurements must be made upon one or both banks, 
from which, by mathematical computations, the neces- 
sary dimensions across the stream may be ascertained. 
In the course of construction, the surveyor must be at 
hand to see that the proper lines and grades are ob- 
served. If a pier is to be built in mid-stream, the loca- 
tion of the works must be indicated to those in charge 
of the floating equipment, by observers stationed upon 
the banks, who make the necessary measurements and 
observations. 

Extreme accuracy is sometimes required in the work 
of the surveyor. If he is giving the lines or making 
the surveys for a building where land is very expensive, 
as for instance, in the business section of a great city, 
an error of a small fraction of an inch may be a serious 
matter, for if an owner proceeding to erect a building 
on Wall Street in New York should discover that an ad- 
joining owner had built his building so that it en- 
croached even by a fraction of an inch upon the adjoin- 
ing lot, an adjustment of the matter might involve 
thousands of dollars. If the engineer is locating a 



30 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

bridge pier in mid-stream, extreme accuracy is equally 
important in order that when the pier is built, the steel 
superstructure which has been designed and built in 
the bridge shop, may rest upon it in exactly the proper 
position. 

The work of the surveyor often involves extended 
travel and severe exposure. In the construction of a 
line of railroad, for instance, the first step is to make 
a survey in order to ascertain where the line should be 
placed. This decision is usually made by a locating 
engineer, who, equipped with the necessary instruments, 
travels on foot or on horseback, or by some other means 
of conveyance, over the country in which the line may 
be located, observing elevations, distances, and topo- 
graphical configuration, and as a result of his decision, 
the surveyors lay out the line, indicating the center 
line by means of stakes, and when this line has been 
finally located in a position satisfactory to the engineer, 
it serves as a base for the work of construction. This 
will be referred to later under the head of railroad en- 
gineering, but it is here evident that where a line has 
to be located in mountainous and otherwise difficult 
country, the work of the surveyor may be arduous and 
difficult. It should be noted, however, that the term 
"surveyor" does not usually include an engineer who 
does work of this kind, who is rather termed a railroad 
engineer, although the operations which he performs 
are those of surveying. The point to be observed is 
that work of surveying is an essential preliminary to 
almost any engineering project, that it involves ac- 



BRANCHES OE CIVIL ENGINEERING 31 

curate and painstaking work in the open air, in which 
an error of measurement may be attended by serious 
consequences. The proper prosecution of this work, 
and its representation upon paper, requires a knowl- 
edge of mathematics, principally of the branches of 
geometry and trigonometry. It also requires re- 
sourcefulness on the part of the surveyor in order that 
difficulties which are encountered may be properly met. 
In laying down a straight line upon the ground, for 
instance, if a building is encountered, the surveyor 
must be able to pass around it and continue the straight 
line on the other side. If he is laying out a railroad or 
an irrigating flume through a ravine with precipitous 
sides, he must be able to make the necessary measure- 
ments and place the proper marks upon the ground. 
The surveyor must, therefore, be active, athletic, 
healthy, as well as resourceful and possessed of the 
requisite mathematical knowledge. 

The work of the surveyor, properly speaking, is 
principally requisite in measuring or laying out par- 
cels of land. The public lands of the United States are 
laid out in sections of definite area, bounded by lines 
running north and south and east and west. For the 
proper laying out of these sections, county surveyors 
are appointed by the government. In order to carry 
on their work properly, it is frequently necessary for 
them to be able to make such observations as will enable 
them to determine the true meridian and also the posi- 
tion of a given point on the earth's surface. They 
must, therefore, have some knowledge of astronomy, 



32 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

so that they may be able to make observations at night 
by the aid of the stars, and may run the lines in the 
true directions. 

An important branch of surveying is mine sur- 
veying, which enables the surveyor, by dropping a 
plumb line through a shaft, to run lines along subter- 
ranean channels and drifts and to know just where these 
lines lie below the surface, so that he can locate another 
shaft on the surface, which may be carried down to meet 
the underground workings. Similar operations are 
necessary in the construction of tunnels for railroad 
lines and other purposes. A survey of the surface of 
the ground having first been made, it is decided that a 
tunnel shall be built between two points fixed in position 
on the map and on the ground. The surveyor must be 
able, starting at these points on the surface of the 
ground, to indicate the direction of the line for the 
tunnel with such accuracy, both as to line and grade, 
that it will be directed between the two desired points. 
Sometimes the tunnel is begun at both ends, and the 
construction carried on toward the center. If the sur- 
vey is correct and the lines and grades properly given, 
the two drifts come together with great accuracy. 
Sometimes an intermediate shaft is located upon the line 
of the tunnel and excavated from the surface to the 
proper grade, and drifts carried from this shaft in one 
or both directions to meet the drifts from the ends. 
Inaccuracy in this work may have serious results, for 
if the two tunnels from the two entrances should not 
meet at the same elevation, or on the same line, but with 



BRA.NCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 83 

a considerable lateral and vertical divergence, or either, 
then the discrepancy would have to be corrected by ad- 
ditional excavation, inasmuch as the size of the tunnel 
is made only large enough to afford the requisite clear- 
ance for the vehicles which are to pass through it. If 
the tunnel should be in soft material, built with so- 
called shields, and finished and lined as they progressed, 
the adjustment of any considerable discrepancy might 
be extremely difficult. Great accuracy is, therefore, 
necessary in work of this kind, and when it is remem- 
bered that the work underground must be based upon 
measurements on the surface, and that in some cases 
these surface measurements are indirect, as for instance, 
where a tunnel passes under a body of water, the 
seriousness and importance of accuracy is evident. 

In the construction of the Hoosac Tunnel on the 
Fitchburg Railroad in Massachusetts under Hoosac 
Mountain a shaft was sunk from a point nearly mid- 
way between the two ends, and the tunnel was built in 
each direction from this shaft, as well as from the 
two ends. The total length of the tunnel is 15,74<3 
feet, or very closely 3 miles. When the drifts met, the 
deviation at one meeting point was 5-16 of an inch and 
at the other 9-16 of an inch, a remarkable example of 
accurate underground surveying. 

The East Boston Tunnel which passes under the 
Harbor of Boston, connecting the city proper with 
East Boston, is 5,176 feet long between the nearest 
stations on each side. It is not straight, but on the 
Boston side there is a curve 1,789 feet long with a ra- 



34 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

dius of 2,000 feet. The tunnel was built with a so-called 
shield, which was pushed forvrard through the clay 
of which the bottom of the Harbor consists, and behind 
the shield, as it was pushed forward, the concrete which 
formed the lining of the tunnel was placed. When con- 
nections were made there was a deviation of 0.84* inch in 
grade and 4* inches in line, which was considered satis- 
factory. 

Even in the early days remarkably accurate work 
was done. In the construction of the Erie Canal, some 
100 years ago, one of the engineers. Judge James 
Geddes, made a survey between Rome, N. Y., and the 
east end of Oneida Lake, embracing nearly 100 miles of 
levelling, and the difference at the junction of the 
levels was said to be less than 1 1-2 inches. 

The accuracy which can be attained by skilled sur- 
veyors, as evidenced by the above instances, is remark- 
able, particularly when it is remembered that their work 
is based upon measurements made on the surface of 
ground, which is often undulating, and in which such 
accuracy as may be obtained in a physical laboratory 
is, of course, out of the question. Fog and smoke, also, 
sometimes make accurate measurements difficult, as in 
the case of the East Boston Tunnel. 

When the operations of the surveyor cover such an 
extended area that the curvature of the earth's surface 
must be taken into account, that is to say, the figure 
of the earth, the work is said to belong to the field of 
geodesy. All ordinary surveying operations cover such 
areas that they may be considered as projected upon 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 35 

a horizontal plane, but where very large areas have 
to be considered, the fact that the earth is a spheroid 
has to be taken into account. The field of geodesy 
involves some of the most complex and intricate opera- 
tions and computations in the whole field of engineering, 
and constitutes in reality a distinct science. In the 
survey of a state, for instance, a base line has to be 
measured with the utmost accuracy by the use of ap- 
pliances such as micrometers, etc., like those used in 
physical measurements in the laboratory. Such a 
physical phenomenon as the temperature has to be 
taken into account and corrected, and measurements 
must be repeated again and again in order to eliminate 
errors. This base line is located, if possible, on land 
which is nearly level, so that errors due to differences 
of elevation, may be, so far as possible, eliminated. 
From this base line angular measurements are made to 
distant points on mountain tops or on buildings, until 
the entire state is covered by a net-work of triangles. 
By means of the necessary computations, the state 
boundaries may be marked by monuments, and the 
sub-divisions, such as counties, may be also laid out. 
Precise methods of leveling and other refinements, to- 
gether with mathematical computations of great com- 
plexity, are often necessary. 

The United States Coast and Geodetic Survey has 
in its charge the carrying on of measurements of this 
kind, with the object of providing accurate maps of the 
coasts and of the various parts of the country. The 
United States Geological Survey also carries on much 



36 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

work of this kind, cooperating with the various states 
in making state surveys. Among other problems upon 
which the work of the Coast Survey throws some light, 
and which have been the subject of its investigations, 
is that of the precise shape or figure of the earth con- 
sidered as a spheroidal body. 

Geodesists have at various times, aided by astronom- 
ical observations, computed the length of a degree of 
latitude at different parts of the earth's surface. A 
comparison of the results of such measurements show 
that the length of a degree of latitude is not every- 
where the same, and by studying the variations, as well 
as by other measurements, the shape or figure of the 
earth is found with considerable accuracy. 

The work of the U. S. Coast Survey affords good 
examples of the accuracy attainable at reasonable cost. 
Greater accuracy would be possible, but the cost would 
not justify it. This illustrates how the economic ele- 
ment should enter into all engineering work. The 
policy of the Coast Survey is to attain such accuracy 
as is justified, and no greater. The following examples 
may be given, for which I am indebted to Professor 
John F. Hayford of Northwestern University, long 
connected with the Survey, and to Messrs. William 
Bowie and R. L. Faris, of the Survey. 

In running a line of levels, determining the elevation 
of different points and coming back to the starting 
point, the line will generally not close, that is to say, 
the level of the starting point will not be found at the 
end to be what was assumed at starting. For precise 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 37 

work in running levels between two points, each short 
section of the line is run once in the forward direction 
and once in a backward direction. The mean of the two 
results is accepted if within the allowed tolerance. 

In the loop San Diego-Brigham-San Francisco, the 
closing error, as given by the unadjusted levels, is 
0.2612 meters (about 0.86 ft.). The correction which 
would close this circuit of 3,027 kilometers is 0.086 
mm. per kilometer (about 0.0054 inch per mile). 
Similarly, the correction which would close the circuit of 
2,474 km. Reno-Brigham-Las Vegas-Reno, is 0.03 mm. 
per km. Nearly all the precise levelling done by the 
Survey in recent years closes loops with an average 
of very little over 0.00052 ft. per mile (0.00624 in. per 
mile). In triangulation, the average closing error of 
a triangle for 66 sections of primary triangulation was 
1.04 seconds. In measuring base lines, the probable 
error of a modem base is 1 part in 3,000,000. 

The topographic surveys made by the states, in 
connection with the U. S. Geological Survey, which 
show contour lines, are of great value to engineers in 
connection with the location of roads and railways, 
and also in studies of projects for water supply and 
water power. 

In connection with surveys, photography is playing 
a more and more important part, and aerial photo- 
graphs are also being used. A complete map of a city 
may be made by taking aerial photographs and putting 
them together. This is a promising future development. 

The work of the surveyor or geodesist often involves 



38 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

public matters of importance, as in laying out town, 
state, or national boundaries, as laid down in grants, 
statutes, or treaties. In 1789, Major Andrew EUicott, 
one of the early American surveyors, surveyed the 
western boundary line of the State of New York, the 
main object being to ascertain whether or not the town 
of Erie, Pa. (then Presque Isle), was in New York. 
The line was found to pass some twenty miles east of 
Presque Isle, and the area in which that town was 
situated was afterward purchased by Pennsylvania 
from the United States. The same engineer, in 1790, 
surveyed a large tract of land which had been sold to 
one Robert Morris, adjoining a tract which had been 
illegally leased from the Indians and the lease of which 
had been declared void by the State of New York. 
There was a dispute as to the boundaries of this area, 
the boundary line, as run by the surveyor of the Lease 
Co., being west of the present city of Geneva. Ellicott 
found the true line to be as far east of Geneva as the 
previous survey had found it west of that place, and 
the difference made 84,000 acres in favor of Robert 
Morris in what is now a very valuable and beautiful 
portion of New York. In 1811 Ellicott ran the north- 
em boundary of Georgia, and in 1817, by order of the 
government, he made astronomical observations near 
Montreal to aid in carrying into effect some of the 
articles of the Treaty of Ghent. 

In recent years, American topographical engineers 
have been called upon to make surveys of territory in 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 39 

dispute between Costa Rica and Panama, and more re- 
cently to lay out the line as fixed by treaty. 

2. Railroad Engineering 

Of all branches of engineering, none are of more 
benefit to the human race than those which improve 
means of transportation. Macaulay in his History of 
England, long ago, made the following striking state- 
ment to this effect. He said: 

"The chief cause which made the fusion of the different 
elements of society (in 1685) so imperfect, was the ex- 
treme diflSculty which our ancestors found in passing from 
place to place. Of all inventions, the alphabet and the 
printing press alone excepted, those inventions which 
abridge distance have done most for the civilization of our 
species. Every improvement in the means of locomotion 
benefits mankind morally and intellectually as well as ma- 
terially, and not alone facilitates the interchange of the 
various productions of nature and art, but tends to remove 
national and provincial antipathies and to bind together 
all the branches of the great human family." 

It is very important for the young man contemplat- 
ing the choice of a profession to perceive clearly its 
larger opportunities for service to the human race. It 
is also important for all of us, old or young, to realize 
the blessings which lie at our hand rather than to com- 
plain that we do not possess others, or to criticize those 
who have been the means of furnishing us with those we 
have, because, like all human beings, they made some 
mistakes. 



40 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

Prior to the railroad era, land transportation was 
entirely by horse-drawn vehicles over roads which were, 
in most cases, of miserable character. Macaulay gives 
a striking description of the condition of the English 
highways in the seventeenth century. He says: 

"Those highways appear to have been much worse than 
might have been expected from the degree of wealth and 
civilization which the nation had even then attained. On 
the best lines of communication^ the roads were deep^ the 
descents precipitous, and the way often such as it was 
hardly possibly to distinguish in the dusk from the un- 
closed heath and fen which lay on both sides. Ralph 
Thoresby, the antiquary, was in danger of losing his way 
on the Great North Road of Barnby Moor and Tucksford, 
and actually lost his way between Doncaster and York. 
. . . Often the mud lay deep on the right and on the 
left and only a narrow track of firm ground rose above 
the quagmire. ... It happened almost every day that 
coaches stuck fast until a team of cattle could be pro- 
cured from some neighboring farm to tug them out of 
the slough. But in bad seasons the traveler had to en- 
counter inconveniences still more serious. Thoresby, who 
was in the habit of traveling between Leeds and the 
capital, has recorded in his diary such a series of perils 
and disasters as might suffice for a journey to the frozen 
ocean or to the Desert of Sahara. . . . The great road 
through Wales to Holyhead was in such a state that in 
1685 a viceroy going to Ireland, was five hours in traveling 
fourteen miles from St. Asaph to Conway. Between Con- 
way and Beaumaris he was forced to walk a great part of 
the way and his lady was carried in a litter. In gen- 
eral, carriages were taken to pieces at Conway and borne 
on the shoulders of stout Welsh peasants to the Menai 
Straits. In some parts of Kent and Sussex none but the 
strongest horses could in winter get through the bog in 
which at every step they sank deep. The markets were 
often inaccessible during several months. It is said that 



BRANCHES OF CIYIL ENGINEERING 41 

the fruits of the earth were sometimes suffered to rot in 
one place, while in another place, distant only a few 
miles, the supply fell far short of the demand. . . . 

"When Prince George of Denmark visited the stately 
mansion of Pelworth in wet weather, he was six hours in 
going nine miles, and it was necessary that a body of 
sturdy hinds should be on each side of his coach in order 
to prop it. Of the carriages which conveyed his retinue, 
several were upset and injured." 

We do not now realize the difficulties of transpor- 
tation in this country a generation ago or a hundred 
years ago. About 1770 President Quincy, of Harvard 
College, described a stage journey between Boston and 
New York; — it required a week of hard traveling. 
In 1775, when Washington came to take command of 
the American Army, he was twelve days in coming from 
Philadelphia to Cambridge. 

The stages in those days left very early in the morn- 
ing, usually at 5 o'clock, but sometimes at 4, and 
sometimes even at 2. In 1826, Josiah Quincy traveled 
from Boston to New York in 4 days, and from New 
York to Washington in 4 more. At this period there 
was a law in New England prohibiting traveling on 
Sunday, except from necessity or charity, and this 
law was not repealed until 1887. There is an interest- 
ing story with regard to the enforcement of this law 
in the town of Andover, Mass. 

"The good people of that town being very much disturbed 
by wicked violations of the law, determined to have it 
strictly enforced, and appointed a worthy deacon to see 
that the officers performed their duties. He accordingly 
denied himself the privilege of going to church, and sta- 



42 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

tioned himself with the officers at a toll gate just outside 
the town. A gentleman traveling in a carriage was 
stopped and told that he could go no farther. With great 
courtesy he said: 'Gentlemen, I am fully aware of the 
provisions of law, and, of course, it is proper that you 
should enforce them, but you must remember that those 
people are excepted who travel from necessity or charity. 
Now, gentlemen, the fact is that my mother is lying dead 
in Boston and I ask that I may be permitted to pass.' 
After consultation they allowed him to pass. When he had 
reached a safe distance, he stopped and called back, 'Don't 
forget to tell the good people of Andover that you per- 
mitted me to pass because my mother is lying dead in 
Boston, and you may add, also, if you please, that she has 
been lying dead there for some twenty years.' " 

When General Grant left his home in Georgetown, 
Ohio, in 1839, to go to West Point, there were no tele- 
graphs, no railroads west of the Allegheny Mountains, 
and but few east. He went by boat on the Ohio to 
Pittsburgh in three days, although he suffered no vexa- 
tious delays, which were common, sometimes lasting 
two or three days. From Pittsburgh he went to Harris- 
burg by canal, the canal boats being carried over the 
mountains on inclined planes. At Harrisburg he took 
the railroad and proceeded at a speed averaging 12 
miles an hour, which to him "Seemed like annihilating 
space." The roads of those times, at any rate in New 
England, were almost without exception absolutely 
straight, veering neither to the right nor to the left. 
When a hill was in the way, they went over it. The 
charters of the turnpike corporations, in defining the 
route, generally required that the road should be built 
nearly straight, or as straight as possible. It 



BRANCHES OF CIYIL ENGINEERING 43 

was not realized that it is sometimes as far, and almost 
always a great deal harder, to go over a hill than 
around its base. On the Salem Turnpike a very small 
but peculiarly deep pond was encountered. The build- 
ers would not go around it, but built a floating bridge 
over it, which is still in use.* 

The facilities for traveling were not as great as in 
the time of the ancient Romans. Gibbon tells us of the 
excellence of the Roman roads and of a magistrate, 
who, in the time of Theodosius, traveled from Antioch 
to Constantinople, a distance of 665 English miles, in 
6 days. Gibbon says, "Houses were everywhere erected 
at a distance of only 5 or 6 miles, and each of them 
was constantly provided with 40 horses, and by the 
help of these relays it was easy to travel 100 miles a 
day along the Roman roads.'* 

Yet in 1826, as Mr. Quincy tells us, when the journey 
from Boston to New York required 4 days, travelers 
"congratulated themselves upon living in the days of 
rapid communication" and "looked with commiseration 
upon the condition of our fathers, who were wont to 
consume a whole week in traveling between those 
cities." 

During the era just preceeding the advent of the 
railway, many canals were built in the United States. 
In 1792, a charter was granted for a canal from the 

* A good deal of very interesting information regarding these 
matters is contained in a 'paper by Hon. George G. Crocker, pub- 
lished in 1900, entitled "From the Stage Coach to the Railroad 
Train and the Street Car." This paper has been largely used in 
the preparation of this article. It will well repay study. 



M THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

Connecticut River to Boston, but it was not built. In 
the following year, a charter was granted for a canal 
from the Merrimac to near Boston. This Middlesex 
Canal was opened in 1803 and continued in use for 
about 50 years. It was 27 miles long, 30 feet wide, 
and 4 feet deep, and boats traveled at the rate of about 
2 miles per hour. The opening of the Erie Canal in 
1825 revived the agitation in favor of canals, and the 
legislature of Massachusetts appointed a committee 
to consider the feasibility of a canal, not simply be- 
tween Boston and the Connecticut River, but between 
Boston and the Hudson River. The Committee reported 
that such a canal was feasible and advisable. The 
estimated cost was $6,000,000. The committee recom- 
mended that the funds should be raised by a lottery 
run by the state. 

In 1826, Gridley Bryant obtained a charter from 
the Legislature of Massachusetts to build a railroad 
from the granite quarries in Quincy to the Neponset 
River, for the purpose of carrying the stone to be used 
in the construction of Bunker Hill Monument. This 
road was built and put in operation in October, 1826. 
It was built with stone ties and was operated by horses. 
It was not the first railroad in America, some small 
ones having been built previously by laying scrap rails 
on wooden stringers, all for horse operation. In 
1827-28 some short lines were built for carrying coal 
in Pennsylvania. In 1829, Horatio Allen made a re- 
port to the Directors of the South Carolina Railroad 
recommending operation by locomotive steam power. 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 45 

This was, consequently, the first railroad which was 
authorized to be built expressly for locomotive steam 
power. The directors of the Livei-pool and Manchester 
Railroad in England had not determined at that time 
what power should be used. 

The charter of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad was 
granted in 1828 and a portion of the road was opened 
in 1830, operated by horses. In 1829 a commission 
reported to the Massachusetts Legislature recommend- 
ing the construction of a railroad to the Hudson 
River, the tracks to be laid on two parallel stone walls 
surmounted by a rail of granite with a bar of iron on 
the top to form the tracks. This commission recom- 
mended operation by horses and suggested that a plat- 
form on wheels be provided for long down-grades, 
on which the horse himself might ride down hill. The 
same expedient has been actually used on one or two 
short roads in the United States within 20 years, in 
which a tram car was provided with a rear platform 
on which the horse could ride down hill. 

Some of these early roads contemplated the opera- 
tion of railroads in a manner similar to that of turn- 
pikes, the idea being that any person could drive his 
cart or carriage on this road, only horse-power being 
thought of. 

Mr. Crocker gives an interesting brief account of 
the development of the steam locomotive, which is as 
good a brief account as the writer is acquainted with. 

The modem railway is thus less than a century old. 
The earliest English railways, namely, the tramways 



46 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

on the Tyne and Tees, were built to carry coal. The 
first passenger line was that between Stockton and 
Darlington, a distance of 12 miles, which was opened 
for traffic in 1825. When this line was first considered 
passengers were not thought of, and it was only while 
the works were in progress that the starting of a pas- 
senger coach was seriously contemplated. A coach 
called "The Experiment" was built and drawn by one 
horse. The first act providing for the construction of 
this line required that it should be free to all parties 
who chose to use it at prescribed rates, and that any- 
one could put horses and wagons on the railway and 
carry for himself. The first considerable passenger 
line was that between Liverpool and Manchester, which 
was opened in 1830. Before its opening there was much 
dispute as to whether it should be operated by loco- 
motives or by stationary engines. Finally the direc- 
tors decided in favor of locomotives and offered a prize 
of £500 for a locomotive which should best fulfill cer- 
tain requirements, the chief of which were that the 
engine must consume its own smoke, attain a speed of 
10 miles an hour with a boiler pressure of not over 
50 pounds, and must haul a load fixed in proportion to 
its weight. A memorable competition was held at 
Rainhill in October, 1829, and was won by Stephenson's 
"Rocket," which hauled a coach containing 30 passen- 
gers at the rate of 26 to 30 miles an hour. The 
*'Rocket'* weighed, with coal and water, 4% tons. 

The first locomotive built in the United States and 
operated on a track without a rack rail was the "Tom 



BRANCHES OF CITIL ENGINEERING 47 

Thumb," which was run upon the Baltimore and Ohio 
Railroad in 1829. On its first trip it had a race with 
a car drawn by a horse, which was won by the horse. 

From these early days of the railroad, within the 
short space of less than a century, the modern railroad 
has been developed by the genius of engineers, until 
to-day, as everybody knows, every civilized country is 
traversed by these iron roads, on which locomotives 
operate, that weigh, with their tenders, over 200 tons, 
and run at speeds of over 60 miles per hour. The con- 
struction and operation of these roads is a field of the 
civil engineer. 

Although most civilized countries are now adequately 
provided with railroads, there are still many more to 
be built in undeveloped countries, and even the existing 
roads must be enlarged and provided with increased 
facilities in the way of additional tracks, terminals, 
equipment, signals, etc. South America has but few 
miles of railroad in proportion to its area, and it is 
not long since a line over the Andes connecting Chile 
and the Argentine Republic was completed. Even in 
our neighboring country of Canada two new transcon- 
tinental lines have been built within about 10 years, one 
of them aff'ording a continuous line of rails across the 
continent with a grade of not over 0.4 per cent from 
Winnipeg to the Pacific Coast. The great Canadian 
Pacific line from Montreal to Vancouver, a distance of 
2,906 miles, was begun in 1874 and formally opened 
in 1886. This line, as most people know, was at first 
built with heavy grades, but within recent years, by the 



48 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

construction of tunnels, some of these built in loops 
so that there is a corkscrew within a mountain, this 
line has reduced its grades to reasonable modem limits. 
On some of our mountain roads these loops, twists and 
turns are very common because of the necessity of 
rising a considerable vertical distance in a very short 
horizontal distance, and sometimes four levels of rail- 
way can be seen from a single point. 

Not only does the engineer build railroads over 
mountain ranges by means of tunnels, spirals, and 
loops, but he carries the iron horse to the very tops 
of mountain peaks, by means of the so-called rack 
rail. A continuous rack is laid between the two rails, 
and a pinion on the locomotive engages with this rack, 
so that the locomotive is able to haul a light load up 
a very steep incline. Everybody is familiar with the 
rack railroad leading to the top of Pike's Peak, and 
travelers in Europe are familiar with similar roads up 
the Rigi and Mount Pilatus, and other Swiss moun- 
tains. The engineer goes further. He carries passen- 
gers in suspended cars carried by wheels overhead 
running on a cable or a track, not only over the city 
streets, as in Elberfeld in Germany, but to the lower 
summits in Switzerland. 

With the expansion of transportation, and especi- 
ally with the need of rapid transportation in cities, 
elevated and underground roads have been built, as 
in Boston, New York, Chicago, Berlin, London, Paris, 
and other cities. In New York City the subway system 
is very extensive, and near the Grand Central Station 



BRANCHES OF CIYIL ENGIiNTlERING 49 

there are four levels of transportation, one above the 
other. Tunnels are built to carry high speed trains 
under the Thames at London, the Mersey at Liverpool, 
the Hudson at New York, the St. Clair at Detroit, 
and with the advent of electric power, there is no doubt 
that at some time there will be a tunnel under the 
English Channel. The St. Gothard Tunnel in Switz- 
erland is 9-1/3 miles long; the Mont Cenis Tunnel is 
8-1/4 miles long, and the latest tunnel, the Simplon, 
is 12-1/4 miles long. There are 52 tunnels on the 
line between Florence and Bologna, and more than that 
on some of the mountain roads in the United States. 

When the Union Pacific Railroad was built and ar- 
rived at Salt Lake, it found that great body of water 
lying directly across its path. The possibility of 
carrying the line across the lake was considered but 
given up, and the road was diverted to the north 
around the shores over a steep and crooked route. 
When Mr. Edward H. Harriman obtained control of 
the road he approved a project to build the so-called 
Lucin Cut-off, which runs straight from Ogden over the 
lake on a trestle nearly 12 miles long and on 20 miles 
of fiU. This cut-off saves 43 miles of distance and 
eliminates much curvature and many steep grades, but 
it was not constructed without many difficulties and 
much discouragement, over all of which the engineer 
triumphed, until in 1903 the new line was opened. 

Notwithstanding the substantial completion of our 
lines of railroad, they still require the expenditure of 
almost as much money on new construction, for im- 



50 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

provements and enlargements, as at any time in the 
past. The civil engineer is the man who designs and 
carries through this work. He must have the vision 
to see possibilities; he must have the financial acumen 
to determine whether they are worth while; he must 
have the power of convincing others, which will enable 
him to secure the approval of his plans ; he must have 
the executive ability and the power of controlling 
other men, to enable him to carry them to a successful 
completion. 

One of the greatest wonders in connection with rail- 
roads is the safety with which they are operated. We 
occasionally hear of a railroad wreck in which many 
people are killed, and we are thrilled with horror ! We 
do not stop to think or to learn that more people are 
killed by street cars, by automobiles, or even by light- 
ning, than are killed by railroads. The safety of their 
operation is remarkable when fairly considered. By 
means of automatic signals, by means of brakes which 
can stop a train moving at 60 miles per hour within a 
distance of 1,060 feet, and by safety appliances of many 
kinds, the danger of railroad travel has been so reduced 
that it is almost negligible, and yet there is still abun- 
dant opportunity for providing greater safety. Many 
lines are inadequately provided with signals and other 
safety appliances. The field and the prospects for the 
railroad engineer are continually growing. Moreover, 
the civil engineer, who engages in railroad work, may 
now look forward, if he is deserving, of being called 
upon, not only to construct, but to direct and manage 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 51 

the operations of our railroads. Not a few railroad 
presidents have come up from the corps of engineers, 
and if the civil engineer, instead of confining himself to 
narrow technical details, as he too often does, will study 
the questions of railroad management and financial 
policy, he will find abundant opportunity for the exer- 
cise of talents of the highest order. 

3. Highway Engineering 

The construction of roads is one of the oldest 
branches of engineering. The Romans built an elabo- 
rate system of roads, having a roadbed which is said to 
have been in some cases 4 feet thick, with large stones 
at the bottom. This is much thicker than is even now 
necessary. The Romans also built stone arches and 
aqueducts that have endured until the present day. 

Gibbon tells us that all the cities were connected with 
each other, and with the capital, by public highways ; 
the great chain of communication from the wall of 
Antoninus in Britain, to Rome, and thence to Jerusa- 
lem, having a length of 3,74*0 English miles. 

In the middle ages the roads were neglected, and 
even up to the middle of the 18th century the roads in 
every country of Europe were in a frightful condition. 
About that time, Tresaguet, in France, began the con- 
struction of the modem system of roads which have be^ 
come famous ; and McAdam and Telford, in England, 
gave their attention to the subject. Tresaguet used 
a foundation of large stones, with a surface of smaller 



52 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEEEING 

stones. McAdam placed his surface of broken stone 
directly upon the prepared ground, without stone foun- 
dation, a surface known by his name, modified to 
*'macadam." Telford modified McAdam's construction 
by adding a foundation similar to that which Tresa- 
guet had used earlier. Since then the construction 
of roads has steadily increased, and it is recognized 
that the excellence of its roads is a good measure of 
the civilization of a country. The growth of cities, too, 
has led to the introduction of many forms of street 
pavement. 

The business of the highway engineer is to know how 
to locate, construct and maintain roads and pave- 
ments. Many roads have been badly located, running 
in too nearly straight lines, up hill and down, without 
sufficient reference to grade. It was not realized that 
a road over a hill may be longer, as well as much harder 
than one around its base. Since a grade limits the load 
that can be hauled, many roads have had to be re- 
located, or the grades have been made easier by cut- 
ting the summits and filling the hollows. 

The proper construction and drainage of a road is 
important, and the engineer must know how to make use 
of available materials in a way to secure economy of 
original cost and of maintenance. He must know the 
physical and chemical qualities of the various materials, 
and how to test them. The kinds of materials and of 
roads are numerous. First there is the ordinary dirt 
or gravel road, which, if properly constructed and 



BRANCHES OE CIVIL ENGINEERING 53 

maintained, is about as pleasant as any to ride over, 
except for dust and sometimes mud; then there is the 
macadam road with a surface of broken stone, properly 
screened and rolled, and with a surface binder; then 
there is the same with a Telford foundation of heavy 
stones, which is better suited for severe trafSc; then 
there is the concrete surface which has recently come 
into use; and finally there are the various bituminous 
materials now used for roads. The use of these bitu- 
minous materials has come within recent years, and has 
practically opened an entire new field to the highway 
engineer, requiring a knowledge of the chemical prop- 
erties of these materials in order to secure proper re- 
sults. For city streets there are numerous materials 
and forms of construction, such as wood blocks, stone 
blocks, brick, macadam, asphalt, bituminous concrete, 
and cement concrete, each applicable under certain con- 
ditions and varying in cost and wearing power. 

Since the advent of the automobile the interest in 
good roads has received a great impetus, and great 
sums are being expended by the states and by the na- 
tional government for road construction. The first 
state to create a state Highway Commission was Mas- 
sachusetts, which established such a commission in 
1893, though other states had previously appropriated 
money for road construction. Many states now have 
such Commissions, which cooperate with the U. S. 
Government in the expenditure of money for road con- 
struction. Massachusetts has expended for road con- 



54 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

struction approximately the following' sums in the 
years specified, which give an idea of the increasing 
importance of this subject: 

In 1895 construction $400,000; 
1900 " 500,000; 

1905 " 450,000; maintenance $60,000 

1910 " 500,000; " 503,627 

1915 " 1,000,000; " 1,004,006 

1920 " 1,000,000; " 2,916,650 

"In 20 years the State has expended for the construc- 
tion of state highways and local roads $23,000,000, and 
for maintenance $15,000,000, a total of $38,000,000. The 
cost of state highways has increased from $6,800 per mile 
in 1895 to an average cost for the modern road in 1921 
of approximately $45,000 per mile." 

The Bureau of Public Roads of the Department of 
Agriculture gives the following table of funds reported 
as available for highway construction in 1921, which 
will give some idea of the magnitude of the road con- 
struction program: 

Funds Available for Road 
State and Bridge Expenditures, 1921 

Alabama $9,000,000 

Arizona 8,000,000 

Arkansas 12,000,000 

California 26,000,000 

Colorado 7,000,000 

Connecticut 8,000,000 

Delaware 3,500,000 

Florida 7,725,000 

Georgia 10,000,000 

Idaho 4,500,000 

Illinois 20,000,000 

Indiana 9,500,000 



BBANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 



55 



State 
Iowa 

Kansas 

Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maine 

Maryland 

Massachusetts 

Michigan 

Minnesota 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

Montana 

Nebraska 

Nevada 

New Hampshire 

New Jersey 

New Mexico 

New York 

North Carolina 

North Dakota 

Ohio 

Oklahoma 

Oregon 

Pennsylvania 

Rhode Island 

South Carolina 

South Dakota 

Tennessee 

Texas 

Utah 

Vermont 

Virginia 

Washington 

West Virginia 

Wisconsin 

Wyoming 



Fxmds Available for Road 
and Bridge Expenditures, 1921 

$37,000,000 
20,000,000 

8,000,000 

6,000,000 

7,500,000 

4,800,000 

8,000,000 
20,000j000 
20,000,000 
11,000,000 
15,000,000 

8,500,000 

6,000,000 

3,500,000 

2,500,000 
16,000,000 

4,000,000 
55,000,000 

6,500,000 

7,000,000 
35,000,000 

8,000,000 
10,000,000 
30,000,000 

1,700,000 

6,000,000 

7,000,000 
10,275,000 

60,000,000 

6,000,000 

2,000,000 
10,000,000 
14,000,000 

8,000,000 
19,500,000 

3,000,000 



Total 



$622,000,000 



5Q THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The approximate total cash expenditures for roads 
and bridges, for all the states, is stated as follows : * 



In 1904 


$59,527,170 


1914 


240,263,784 


1917 


279,915,332 


I9I8 


286,101,198 


1919 


389,455,932 



Many states have now hundreds or thousands of 
miles of magnificent roads of concrete, bituminous ma- 
terial, or macadam, over which not only a vast pleasure 
traffic passes, but a large tonnage in trucks, some of 
these trucks weighing as much as 20 tons loaded. 

These figures will serve to show the growing impor- 
tance of road construction, and the magnitude of the 
field it opens to the civil engineer. 

It is sometimes claimed that the motor truck should 
replace the freight car for freight transportation for 
short hauls, and that it can economically do so. The 
writer considers this a great mistake. The cost of 
transportation by truck is much greater per mile than 
the cost by rail, especially if the cost of road con- 
struction and maintenance is considered, as, of course, 
it should be. It is easy to prove any statement if 
suitable elements of the problem are omitted from con- 
sideration. The interest and amortization charged on 
the cost of roads, and the cost of maintenance, should, 
of course, be apportioned to the traffic carried, in 
order to estimate properly the cost of transportation. 
These charges are high, and there is no doubt that 

* "Public Roads," September, 1920, p. 12. 



BRANCHES OI! CIVIL ENGINEERING 57 

traffic by heavy truck is largely responsible for the 
wear of a road. 

Transportation of freight by rail, unless freight is 
loaded directly from its source at one end into a freight 
car on a siding, and similarly unloaded at the other 
end, involves trucking at each end, the cost of which 
must be considered. A manufacturing establishment 
may, therefore, distribute its products more economic- 
ally by truck than by rail within a certain limited 
distance. The question is, what is the cost from source 
to destination? In estimating this cost, the cost of 
roads and their maintenance should not be omitted, or 
the estimate may be grossly in error. This error is 
sometimes made in comparing the cost of transporta- 
tion by canal with that by rail, and the cost by canal 
is sometimes taken as the mere cost of haulage, the 
interest on the cost of construction and the mainte- 
nance charges being entirely omitted, because they are 
paid by the state or the government. The railroad 
company has to pay its overhead charges and the in- 
terest on its fixed obligations, so that such a com- 
parison is, of course, of no value. 

The heavy motor truck has its proper functions, 
but with the popular enthusiasm for automobiles, we 
are apt to go too far, and to overestimate their im- 
portance and economy. The railroad is and will always 
remain, under normal and proper conditions, the most 
modern and economical method of transporting freight. 
While this does not detract from the importance of 
good roads, there does seem some danger that the road- 



58 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

building program will be over-extended, as was the case 
with canal building a hundred years ago, as will be 
noticed, and that some states will find themselves unduly 
and unhappily overburdened with financial obligations 
for such construction. Balance and a clear vision are 
necessary in this, as in all things. The sum of $622,- 
000,000 for road construction, as given in the table on 
page 55, is an enormous sum, and it may well be that 
it is in part extravagant and unreasonable, though 
the writer cannot prove that it is. Especially at the 
present time, when the world is trying to recover from 
the greatest cataclysm in history, it is necessary to 
practice economy — individual, municipal, and state — 
to keep our feet on the ground, and to indulge in no 
schemes of public expenditure that cannot be proved to 
be self-supporting or fully justified by benefits to be 
received. 

4?. Hifdraidic Engmeering 

This branch of the profession, as its name implies, 
deals with problems involving the use and control of 
water. Certain branches, such as water supply and 
sewerage, which deal largely with questions of the 
public health, and those involving chemistry and bac- 
teriology in their relations to disease, are properly in- 
cluded in the field of sanitary engineering, and are 
described under that head. What is left of hydraulic 
engineering, however, is still a very extensive field, 
covering : 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 59 

(a) The development of water power. 

(b) The regulation of rivers, including the control and 

prevention of floods. 

(c) Canals. 

(d) Coast and harbor works. 

(e) Irrigation engineering. 

(f) Reclamation of marsh lands. 

(a) The development of water power is one of the 
most important branches of hydraulic engineer'ing, 
and one of the most important for the progress of 
civilization. This is an age of power, in which almost 
every industry is dependent upon the use of power. 
The only methods of generating power are by the 
combustion of fuel and the utilization of water power. 
Every pound of fuel which is burned is lost forever, 
and can never be replaced; nevertheless, the consump- 
tion of fuel, including coal and oil, has been increasing 
at a tremendous rate, and if this rate of increase 
continues the available supplies, so far as are now 
known, will certainly be exhausted at some future time, 
which is perhaps not very far off, historically speak- 
ing. What the world will do when that time comes is 
problematical ; perhaps other supplies will be discov- 
ered, or other methods of generating power, as, for in- 
stance, from the sun or by some chemical means. The 
patent fact, however, is that fuels are exhaustible and 
cannot be replaced. 

On the other hand, every pound of water that falls 
over a rapid or waterfall generates a power which, if 
not used, is lost forever; but other pounds of water 



60 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

will continue to fall over that rapid to supply the place 
of that which has been lost. It may therefore be said 
that every pound of fuel which is burned is lost forever, 
while every pound of falling water not utilized is lost 
forever, though other pounds of water take its place. 
The desirability of developing water power and con- 
serving our fuel supply is, therefore, evident. Such 
development should be encouraged in every possible 
way. Unfortunately, the fixed investment in a water 
power plant is larger than that of the steam plant of 
the same capacity, so that the fixed charges are greater, 
although the operating expenses are less in the case 
of water power. The large fixed charges, and the fact 
that a water power plant can only be used for one pur- 
pose, have been the causes of the lack of success of 
some water power developments. Then, too, the atti- 
tude of some states and of the United States Govern- 
ment, instead of encouraging the development of water 
power, has distinctly discouraged it by placing upon it 
various restrictions, burdens and taxes. With the in- 
creasing cost of fuel, however, and a more enlightened 
public sentiment, it is probable that in the future the 
development of water power will be encouraged. It is 
now possible to transmit power by electricity for a dis- 
tance of some 500 miles from its source. Therefore, 
although a water power may be located in an inacces- 
sible mountain district, it may be transmitted and uti- 
lized a long distance away, or it may be used for electri- 
fying railroads passing through the mountains. 

The development of water power requires a thorough 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 61 

acquaintance with the laws of hydrology, that is to say, 
of rain fall, the flow of streams, and the effect of reser- 
voirs ; it requires a great deal of structural work in 
connection with the construction of dams, canals, flumes 
or aqueducts ; and it also requires the work of the 
electrical and mechanical engineer in the planning of 
the machinery for power development and the trans- 
mission lines. Sometimes, by taking advantage of a 
bend in a river, the building of a short canal will 
permit the development of a very large power. In 
France and other foreign countries the development 
of water power is receiving much attention, and a 
project has been prepared for making the River Rhone 
navigable from its mouth to Lake Geneva, and for de- 
veloping, incidentally, a very large amount of water 
power, which can be transmitted to the manufacturing 
cities of France or used for electrifying the railroads. 
This branch of civil engineering is most interesting and 
will offer increasing opportunities. 

(b) The next three branches which have been named 
have largely to do with transportation by water. 
Rivers may be made navigable by the construction of 
locks and dams ; canals may be built for inland naviga- 
tion, as well as for sea-going vessels, as in the case of 
the Suez Canal and the Panama Canal; and coast and 
harbor works are needed for the protection of shores 
and for facilitating commerce. 

The various uses of a river are in a measure interde- 
pendent. The development of a water power on a river 
may be connected with rendering it navigable, with 



62 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

regulating its flow, with the use of the water for irri- 
gation, and for the water supply of cities. The proper 
use for one of these purposes may be consistent or in- 
consistent with its proper use for another. The proper 
regulation of a stream for the development of power 
requires that the reservoirs, if there are any, should 
be drawn upon in such a way as to permit an equable 
flow. The best use for irrigation may require a some- 
what diff^erent utilization of the reservoirs. All these 
various uses of water must be understood by the 
hydraulic engineer, and he must be able to study a large 
project or carry on a given work in such a way as 
to permit of the best development. 

The prevention and control of floods is an important 
subject for the hydraulic engineer. Some rivers have 
an equable flow and rise but little in times of flood ; 
others, like the Ohio River, have a difference of level of 
60 or 70 feet between high water and low water. In 
1913 large areas in the states of Ohio and Indiana were 
visited by an extraordinary flood which destroyed great 
amounts of property. Since that time a Flood Com- 
mission has been created to study the problem and de- 
vise means for regulating the flow of the streams and 
controlling the floods so that there will be as little 
danger from them as possible. Movable dams are 
used on some streams, which may be raised or lowered 
as required. 

(c) Canals are an important branch of engineering 
for the hydraulic engineer. The most obvious oppor- 
tunity for a canal is, of course, to cut across a narrow 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 63 

isthmus separating two seas on which vessels of deep 
draft navigate. Instances of this are the Suez Canal 
and the Panama Canal ; similar instances are the Wel- 
land Canal between Lake Ontario and Lake Erie, and 
the Sault Sainte Marie Canal between Lake Superior 
and Lake Michigan; all of which connect bodies of 
water of considerable depth. Tihe construction of 
such a canal may save several thousands of miles of 
deep water transportation. 

The Pharaohs dug a canal from the northern ex- 
tremity of the Red Sea or the Gulf of Suez westward to 
the nearest branch of the Nile in the eastern Delta 
where the river divides into a number of mouths, so that 
ships from the Mediterranean could sail up the eastern- 
most mouth of the Nile, enter the canal, pass through 
it and reach the Red Sea. Thus the Suez Canal was 
anticipated some 4,000 years ago by the ancient Egyp- 
tians. As everybody knows, the present canal was 
carried through largely by the efforts of the French 
financier, De Lesseps, not on the location above de- 
scribed, but straight across from the northern ex- 
tremity of the Red Sea to the Mediterranean. This 
canal shortened the distance from London or Liverpool 
to India by several thousand miles, and was a monument 
to the engineers who carried it out. It is interesting to 
note, however, that Robert Stephenson, perhaps the 
most noted engineer of the last century, opposed its 
construction, maintaining that it was impracticable. 
It is obvious that even the greatest engineers sometimes 
make mistakes. 



64 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The Panama Canal was first projected by French 
engineers, but after several attempts, was given up by 
them and completed by the United States Government. 
Like the Suez Canal, it saves thousands of miles of 
ocean transportation, between ports of the North At- 
lantic and ports in the Pacific Ocean. 

Canals for inland navigation have at times been very 
extensively constructed, and have required the services 
of many engineers. Before the era of the railroad the 
only means of transportation were by common road and 
by water. Transportation by canal was cheaper than 
by road, and in the early part of the last century 
many canals were constructed both in England and in 
this country. Some of the states of the Union appro- 
priated large sums for canal construction, believing 
that they were laying the foundations for future 
greatness. Most of these canals, however, have now 
been abandoned. The only canal for internal naviga- 
tion — aside from those connecting deep waters — ^which 
has survived in the United States is the Erie Canal. 
The first Erie Canal was 28 feet wide at the bottom, 
40 feet wide on top, and 4 feet deep, with locks 90 feet 
by 12 feet. At the time it was built it was the longest 
canal in the world, built in the shortest time, with the 
least experience, for the least money, and to the 
greatest public benefit. By affording a means of trans- 
portation between the Hudson River and the Great 
Lakes it may even be said that some of the states be- 
yond the Mississippi River almost owed their existence 
to it. At one time, in the amount of its transportation 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 65 

and tonnage, it far exceeded the whole foreign com- 
merce of the United States. 

The construction of this canal was followed by the 
construction of others, and by surveys for the construc- 
tion of others still. Pennsylvania had a system of 
canals which, in connection with inclined planes, enabled 
canal boats to pass over the Allegheny Mountains. 
The boats were run upon a truck or car which, by 
means of cables, was hauled up a comparatively steep 
incline to the summit and allowed to go down a similar 
incline on the other side. The Chesapeake & Ohio Canal 
was built to connect the Atlantic seaboard with the 
Ohio River. Virginia had canals, and so did Ohio and 
Indiana ; but all of these are now abandoned. The 
advent of the railroad provided a means of transpor- 
tation so much easier and quicker, and also less expen- 
sive, that the canals proved useless, and the money 
expended for them was wasted. Several states ex- 
perienced serious financial difficulties on account of 
the appropriation of large sums of money for canal 
building. 

As already stated, the only canal which survived 
was the Erie Canal, but this proved inadequate and the 
traffic upon it greatly diminished and at last became 
practically nil. The state of New York, however, 
undertook to enlarge it, and has constructed the so- 
called Barge Canal in its place, extending from the 
Hudson River to Lake Erie, with a depth of 12 feet. 
Whether this investment will prove profitable is at least 
doubtful. 



66 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

(d) The construction of coast and harbor works 
is a growing field for the hydraulic engineer. A coast 
city must have docks, piers, dry-docks; its channel 
must be kept dredged; light houses must be built; 
loading and unloading devices must be provided at the 
piers; and the interchange of freight must be facili- 
tated, if commerce is to increase. The study of port 
development has engaged the attention of a number 
of commissions and the services of many engineers. 

In improving harbor entrances, not only dredging 
but sometimes submarine mining and blasting are neces- 
sary. At Hell Gate, N. Y., in making a suitable chan- 
nel between Long Island Sound and the East River, 
a network of galleries was excavated under the reef, 
having a total length of nearly a mile and a half; 
the roof, from 6 to 20 feet thick, resting on pillars of 
rock. About 4,460 holes were drilled in the roof and 
filled with explosive, and in 1876 all these were exploded 
simultaneously, blowing off the entire roof. The Mid- 
dle Reef was afterward blown off (in 1885) in the 
same way, by means of over 4 miles of galleries and 
12,560 holes. 

The improvement of the mouths of large rivers 
often gives rise to great engineering undertakings. A 
large river may bring down great quantities of sedi- 
ment which are deposited as a bar across its mouth. In 
some cases the river may have several mouths as, for 
instance, the Mississippi, the Danube, the Nile, the 
Ganges and others. If the river is navigable, it is 
necessary to keep one mouth open with a sufficient 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 67 

depth of water. This may be done by dredging or by 
making the river do its own dredging by confining the 
channel between jetties and so making it scour out a 
channel for itself. Probably everyone has heard of 
the improvement of the Southwest Pass of the Missis- 
sippi River which was undertaken by Captain James 
B. Eads almost half a century ago. In this case 
jetties were built, which have been successful in main- 
taining the required navigable depth, so that large ves- 
sels may proceed up the river to New Orleans and 
other ports. English or American engineers have fre- 
quently been called up by foreign countries to advise 
and draw plans for improvements of this kind, as in 
the case of the mouths of the Danube and the Rio de la 
Plata. 

Harbors are frequently protected by breakwaters 
or jetties within or between which vessels may lie or 
discharge at wharves or in basins. The construction 
of harbors is a very important field of civil engineering 
and involves a study of the ocean currents and their 
effects. Sea-walls and jetties are exposed to the force 
of the waves, which, in the case of heavy storm, may 
be very great. The construction of lighthouses also 
involves a consideration of these forces and of many 
difficult and trying engineering problems. The con- 
struction of such lighthouses as Eddystone Light- 
house in England is generally considered one of the 
triumphs of engineering. 

The difficulty of building a lighthouse on a limited 
ledge of rock, frequently submerged, and only ap- 



68 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

proachable in calm weather, may perhaps be appre- 
ciated even by the layman. The Eddystone Lighthouse, 
in the English Channel, is 9 miles from the nearest 
coast of Cornwall, and had been the scene of frequent 
wrecks. Four lighthouses have been successively built 
there. The first was of wood, and was completed in 
1700, and washed away in 1703. The second was also 
of wood, completed in 1709, and destroyed by fire in 
1755. The great engineer, Smeaton, built the third, 
of stone, completed in 1759, and although the waves 
sometimes dashed over the lantern, it remained in- 
tact: but the sea began to undermine the rock on 
which it stood, and it was decided to take it down 
after erecting another on an adjacent rock. The new 
one was of stone, completed in 1881. The range of 
the light from this lighthouse is 17% miles. 

(e) Irrigation engineering is so extensive as to 
constitute almost a field in itself. In the western 
states, where the rainfall is insufficient for growing 
crops, there are large areas of fertile land which only 
require the application of water to make them blossom 
like the rose. Therefore, irrigation projects were early 
developed for utilizing the streams by turning the water 
upon the land. Similar works have been necessary in 
Italy, India, Egypt, and elsewhere. In India there are 
thousands of reservoirs, and large areas are irrigated, 
for, while the rain fall in northern India .is greater than 
anywhere else on the globe, in other sections of that 
country it falls so low in some seasons that irrigation 
must be depended upon to support the people. 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 69 

(f) The reclamation of marsh lands is an increas- 
ing" field for the hydraulic engineer. Large rivers, 
like the Mississippi, when in flood, overflow great areas, 
which, when the flood subsides, are only partly dry and 
cannot be cultivated unless they are reclaimed by 
being enclosed with embankments which will keep the 
river from overflowing them and protect the crops. 
Everybody knows that a large part of Holland has been 
reclaimed from the sea. It was originally under water 
or partly so, but the construction of dikes and proper 
protective works have brought under cultivation areas 
now inhabited by many thousands of industrious peo- 
ple. 

Enough has been said to show conclusively that the 
field of hydraulic engineering is a most important and 
extensive one ; that it is a clean and interesting branch 
of the profession; that it requires great ability and a 
thorough knowledge of hydraulics, structures, ma- 
terials, and hydrology; and that as long as civilization 
advances and commerce increases, as long as power is 
used, and as long as our rivers flow down hill, there will 
be always abundant opportunities for the hydraulic en- 
gineer to construct works for the benefit and conven- 
ience of man. 

5. Sanitary Engineering 

It is impossible to overestimate the importance of 
this branch of engineering as a contributing factor to 
modern civilization. It deals with the following sub- 
jects: 



70 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

(a) Water Supply, of the individual and of com- 

munities. 

(b) Sewerage Systems, for the individual and for com- 

munities. 

(c) The Purification of Water and Sewage (including 

Trade Wastes) and the Disposal of the latter. 

(d) Street Cleaning and the Disposal of Garbage. 

(e) Heating and Ventilating. 

(f) Swamp Drainage. 

The importance of providing supplies of pure drink- 
ing water for communities, and of disposing of their 
sewage and garbage, are self-evident; and with the in- 
creasing size of cities these problems increase in number 
and in difficulty. At the beginning of the last century 
only about 3 per cent, of the population of the United 
States lived in cities; in 1910, 45.8 per cent, of our 
population was urban (i.e., living in cities and towns 
of over 2,500 population), and in 1920, 51.4 per cent; 
our largest city, New York, has a population of 5,621,- 
151. The number of cities having a population exceed- 
ing 100,000 is 68, and the number having a population 
exceeding 25,000 is 288. There are 3 cities having 
over a million inhabitants, 12 having over 500,000, and 
a number of instances where several large cities are 
close together, forming a metropolitan district of enor- 
mous size. The population of the so-called Metropoli- 
tan District of Boston was 1,070,256 in 1910, and 
1,252,903 in 1920; and it is said that 6 per cent, 
of the population of the country lives within a radius 
of 25 miles of New York, and 12.5 per cent within a 
radius of 100 miles, this limit including Philadelphia. 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 71 

The problem of supplying these immense congrega- 
tions of people with the necessaries of life — with water, 
milk, ice, provisions, and transportation — is almost 
appalling. In regard to some of these it is a question 
of transportation, by rail or by highway. In regard to 
water it is a question of finding an adequate and suffi- 
ciently pure source of supply, bringing it to the city 
by gravity or by pumping, and distributing it by pipes 
under the streets. 

Equally great are the problems of disposing of the 
wastes and garbage of these great cities, in such a way 
that they will not be a menace to the health or comfort 
of other communities. 

While the growth of urban population may be de- 
precated, and even though it may be proved that health 
and civilization will be promoted by a life in the coun- 
try, the phenomenon is one of the most striking socio- 
logical facts of the past century, and it shows no ten- 
dency to change its trend, notwithstanding the cry of 
"back to the country"; although the rate of increase 
of urban population between 1910 and 1920 is generally 
less than the rate of increase between 1900 and 
1910. 

Before the discovery of the Germ Theory of Disease, 
and the proof that typhoid fever and other diseases 
were due to the introduction of bacteria into the human 
system, and that these bacteria could be carried by 
water, food, or air, water supplies were ordinarily ob- 
tained from rivers, lakes, or wells, notwithstanding that 
such sources had in some cases received the sewage of 



72 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

other communities but a short distance from the point 
where the supply was taken. Thus the city of St. 
Louis obtained its water supply from the Mississippi 
River, although other cities had discharged their sewage 
into it but a short distance above. The city of Law- 
rence took its supply from the Merrimac, but a few 
miles below the sewer outlets of Lowell. Water was 
taken from wells which in many cases were close to 
cesspools or other sources of contamination. Dilution, 
filtration, deposition, or a flow of certain number of 
miles in a river, were supposed to effect sufficient purifi- 
cation. It was recognized, of course, that it was not 
desirable to take a supply of water from a source that 
had been contaminated by sewage, but the objection was 
based upon a sentimental repulsion rather than upon 
scientific grounds. Water was sometimes filtered before 
using, but it was mainly to remove objectionable sedi- 
ment or color. 

The discovery of the relation between micro-organ- 
isms and disease, some fifty years ago, changed all this, 
and the subjects of water supply and sewage disposal 
were brought into close and immediate contact with 
the subjects of chemistry and bacteriology. Chemical 
and bacteriological analyses of water and sewage were 
invoked as guides in answering the question whether 
a given water was suitable for use, or whether a given 
sewage could safely be disposed of in a certain manner ; 
and chemical and bacteriological processes were devised 
for treating water and sewage and removing or reduc- 
ing the contamination. 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 73 

The sanitary engineer, therefore, though he need 
not be a chemist or bacteriologist, must yet know 
enough about chemistry and bacteriology to be able to 
understand the processes used in those sciences, and to 
interpret and use the results. 

The problem of water supply is to obtain an ade- 
quate supply of suitable water. The future growth 
of the city and the quantity of water required must be 
estimated. Seasonal and yearly fluctuations in the 
source of supply must be studied, and reservoirs pro- 
vided in such manner that the supply will always be 
great enough even for an exceptional demand, as in 
case of a great fire. The waste of water in our cities, 
by careless use, leakage, and faulty plumbing fixtures, 
is often enormous, and must be studied, and methods 
of reducing it provided. Sometimes it is desirable, or 
even necessary to meter each house supply, so that 
each householder shall pay for what he uses. Dams, 
conduits, and tunnels must be designed, to conduct the 
water to the city, and pumping stations, if pumping is 
necessary. The water shed must be protected from 
contamination if possible, or sometimes large plants 
for filtering or chemically treating the water must be 
provided. The right of way for the conduit must be 
bought, and aqueduct bridges built to carry the water 
over depressions ; or pipe siphons installed to carry it 
underneath. The system of pipe distribution in the 
city must be carefully designed, based on the principles 
of hydraulics and the experimental results regarding 
the flow of water in pipes and conduits. Stand-pipes 



74 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

or reservoirs must be provided at suitable points and 
elevations. 

It is obvious that the sanitary engineer must be 
familiar with hydrology — the laws of rainfall and of 
the flow of streams, and the methods of measuring 
these quantities — with theoretical and experimental 
hydraulics, and with the theory and design of struc- 
tures. He should also know how to deal with statistics 
and to' draw valid conclusions from them. 

The first municipal water supply was introduced 
into Boston in 1848 from Lake Cochituate, less than 
20 miles distant. The event was celebrated with 
much rejoicing. But by 1878 the supply was found 
inadequate, and it was necessary to increase it by going 
to the Sudbury River, where a series of basins was con- 
structed from time to time. By 1892, even this source 
was found inadequate, and a new source of supply was 
sought, this time not for Boston alone, but for the 
Metropolitan District, by going to the Nashua River, 
where a large reservoir was created by building a dam 
with a maximum height of 207 feet. This work re- 
quired the relocating of 6% miles of railroad track, 
completely flooded the sites of several towns and 
villages, and necessitating the removal of 6 mills, 8 
school houses, 4 churches, and 360 houses which had 
been occupied by 1700 people. The work was com- 
pleted in 1905 at a cost of $43,287,875.89, and was 
connected with the Sudbury supply, so that both are 
available. Provision was also made for still further in- 
creasing the supply when demanded. 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 75 

Other large cities have had a similar experience, 
particularly those which cannot take a supply from a 
large river or lake which is almost inexhaustible. Some 
of the cities on the Great Lakes take their supply from 
the lake, by laying a pipe or driving a tunnel to an 
intake some distance out. In such cases, as the water 
near the shores becomes more and more polluted by 
the discharge of sewage, it is necessary from time to 
time to extend the intake further out, or to treat the 
sewage, or even — as in the case of Chicago — to divert 
the sewage from the lake, and discharge it into an- 
other channel. Chicago, by building the Drainage 
Canal, discharged its sewage into the Illinois River, 
through which it flows into the Mississippi, — not to the 
satisfaction of the cities on either river. The result 
was serious, and extended law suits followed, to deter- 
mine claims for damages. 

Los Angeles has recently completed an elaborate 
water supply system, by which the water is brought 
from the Sierra Nevada Mountains, about 259 miles 
distant, where the melting snows supply an adequate 
quantity for many years to come. San Francisco, 
which had previously obtained its supply from surface 
and ground waters within a comparatively short dis- 
tance from the city, both on the peninsula and on the 
opposite side of the bay, is now beginning works to ob- 
tain a supply from the Hetch-Hetchy valley in the 
Sierras, 190 miles distant. 

New York has just completed the largest work for 
water supply that has ever been executed, in ancient 



76 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIYIL ENGINEERING 

or modem times, by bringing water from the Catskills, 
120 miles distant, with provision for still further ex- 
tension. In connection with this work the Kensico 
dam has been built, one of the greatest masonry dams 
in the world, 1850 feet long, with a maximum height 
of 307 feet above the foundation. Some further refer- 
ence to this great work is made in Chapter VII. 

These illustrations will serve to show the magnitude 
of works of water supply, and to demonstrate the fact 
that there will always be a great field for the civil 
engineer in this branch of the profession. 

Of coordinate importance with works of water sup- 
ply are works for the disposal of sewage. Almost all 
the water brought into a city as water supply, after 
fulfilling its purpose, flows away as sewage. Compara- 
tively little is permanently changed into solid or gase- 
ous form. In addition, the sewers must carry a consid- 
erable proportion of the rain which falls over the city 
area, depending upon the ratio of impervious to per- 
vious surface; and there is also sometimes considerable 
leakage of ground water into the sewers, as well as some 
leakage out of them under some circumstances. There 
must in general be a sewer in each street, properly pro- 
portioned and laid out at a suitable grade, and in this 
way the sewage is gathered into main sewers which lead 
to the point of discharge, or often to a pumping sta- 
tion, or to a plant for treating the sewage chemically, 
or by filtration, or by bacteriological action, to make 
it innocuous. Sometimes, in inland cities the sewage 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 77 

is disposed of on land, either without or after treat- 
ment, for irrigation. 

In addition to the sewerage system itself, the design 
and arrangement of the sanitary appliances in dwell- 
ings and in commercial buildings come within the field 
of the sanitary engineer. The designs of the water 
supply and sanitary appliances for a large building, 
with provision for fire protection and for heating and 
ventilation, are often very complex. 

The disposal of garbage is one of the problems of 
sanitary engineering. Probably few of us have ever 
stopped to think what becomes of the ashes and garbage 
from our homes. The ash man comes at intervals and 
takes the ashes away. In some cases they may be 
useful for filling, but if the city is built up, it may be 
necessary to carry them long distances before a proper 
place to dispose of them can be found. The garbage 
must be treated in such a way as to recover, if possible, 
any valuable ingredients, while the remainder is dis- 
posed of by burning, or otherwise, so as to be inoffen- 
sive. The problem of its disposal is, by no means, a 
simple one, and requires chemical, mechanical and sani- 
tary knowledge and experience. In New York City 
the amount of garbage amounts to about 2,000 tons 
a day. 

An aUied subject is that of street cleaning, which 
forms an important part of municipal administration, 
and requires great executive ability on the part of the 
engineer. It is largely a problem of organization, for 



78 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

which an engineering training is an excellent prepara- 
tion. When Col. George E. Waring, an eminent sani- 
tary engineer, was made Commissioner of Street Clean- 
ing of New York City, some 30 years ago, he introduced 
engineering methods into this work and set a standard 
which has been largely followed ever since. 

The subject of heating and ventilation has in itself 
become of late years a specialty, and there is a large 
society composed of engineers practicing in this field, 
which is generally considered as belonging to mechani- 
cal engineering rather than to civU engineering, as it 
is intimately connected with the development of power. 

The drainage of swamps is not only a problem of 
reclaiming land for cultivation, but largely one of 
sanitary engineering, by exterminating mosquitoes. 
Everyone knows to-day that mosquitoes, which breed in 
swamps, are carriers of disease, and that yellow fever 
is caused in this way. Swamp drainage, as a sanitary 
measure, is sure to increase in importance. The Pon- 
tine marshes, in Italy, were for centuries known as 
sources of pestilence, though the cause was not under- 
stood. The conditions in various parts of Europe, due 
to the presence of swamps, is very serious. Some parts 
of the Danube valley are almost uninhabitable on this 
account. It is safe to say that the prosperity of 
Cuba is largely due to the elimination of yellow fever; 
and it is very certain that the construction of the 
Panama Canal was made possible by the efficient work 
of Surgeon-General Wm. C. Gorgas, who had previously 
eliminated yellow fever from Havana, in controlling 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 79 

that disease on the Isthmus. Here is an instance of the 
cooperation of the physician, the administrator, the 
bacteriologist, and the engineer, and such cooperation 
is sure to increase. 

American engineers are sure to be called upon to 
assist in sanitary work in other countries. Recently 
Professor George C. Whipple, of Harvard University, 
was sent to Europe by the League of Red Cross Socie- 
ties to study questions of sanitary engineering in vari- 
ous countries. 

It is obvious from this description that the field of 
the sanitary engineer touches at many points the fields 
of chemistry, bacteriology, and preventive medicine. 
The sanitary engineer must be informed in regard to 
the general subject of Public Health, or the control and 
prevention of disease. 

6. Structural Engineering 

Structural engineering is one of the most important 
fields for the civil engineer, and it is one of the broadest 
fields, because structures occur in every one of the 
branches which have been thus far discussed. 

Structural engineering deals with the design, con- 
struction, and maintenance of fixed structures ; as dis- 
tinguished from machines, the whole or parts of which 
are in motion. The railroad, highway, and municipal 
engineer has to deal with the construction of bridges, 
retaining walls, etc. The structural engineer has also 
to design the construction of buildings. The hydraulic 



80 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

engineer deals with the construction of dams, reser- 
voirs, stand-pipes, water towers, movable dams in 
rivers which are made navigable, and many other struc- 
tures. The railroad engineer also deals with the con- 
struction of tunnels, of coal handling plants, water 
tanks, trestles. The electrical engineer constructs 
towers for electrical transmission lines. Further, the 
engineer builds oil and gas tanks, elevators for the 
storage of grain, and many other structures. 

In problems of rapid transit in cities, elevated rail- 
ways must be built, or subways underground. These 
structures call for innumerable problems in design, 
involving the computation of the pressure of the earth 
and the arrangement and size of the walls, roofs, and 
columns. 

Structural engineering is sometimes supposed to 
deal mainly with bridges. This, of course, is a large 
part of the subject. There are many kinds of bridges, 
varying from the simple beam which spans a short 
opening to enormous cantilever bridges, arches, or 
suspension bridges, like the structures over the East 
River, the St. Lawrence River, or the Firth of Forth. 
There are movable bridges of many kinds, some of 
which revolve about a central pier, some of which are 
lifted bodily into the air, some of which are bascule 
bridges, either single or double, which revolve about 
horizontal pivots at the ends. Some of these structures 
are of great complexity and size. And while they are 
designed by means of methods and formulae based upon 
the principles of the strength of materials and the 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 81 

laws of mechanics, these formulas are often far from 
accurate, so that judgment and experience are quali- 
ties of the highest importance. The failure of such 
structures may involve great loss of life and property. 
For many years the bridge of longest span in the 
world was that over the Firth of Forth in Scotland, 
which has two spans of 1,710 feet each. When a 
bridge across the St. Lawrence at Quebec was proposed, 
the engineer in charge decided to surpass the Forth 
Bridge in dimensions, and designed a structure with a 
span of 1,800 feet. The bridge which he designed, how- 
ever, collapsed before it was completed, owing to faults 
and carelessness in the design, involving the loss of 
74* lives. Many tons of steel now lie at the bottom 
of the St. Lawrence River, the wreck of this first 
Quebec bridge. After this accident, a second bridge 
of the same span was designed by other engineers. 
While the first bridge was planned to be erected by 
building out over the river from two piers near the 
water line, the second bridge was designed to be erected 
by building out only part way and supporting upon 
the ends of the cantilevers so constructed a central 
span built separately and hoisted from pontoons into 
its final position resting on the cantilever arms. While 
this central span was being raised, the support at one 
corner gave way and the entire span was precipitated 
into the river, where it now lies. A new central span 
was constructed in its place and was successfully put 
into position, and the bridge is now in operation. The 
failure of the central span involved the curious para- 



82 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

dox that by increasing the material in a structure or 
a part of a structure, the strength could be decreased. 
These two failures have shed much light on certain 
problems in bridge construction. Recently a suspen- 
sion bridge with a span of 1,750 feet has been proposed, 
to cross the Delaware River at Philadelphia. 

The construction of high buildings affords another 
important example of structural engineering. It also 
illustrates the relation between engineering and archi- 
tecture. The completion of a building involves really 
three distinct branches ; first, its construction ; second, 
its arrangement from the point of view of conveni- 
ence of use; and third, its architectural appearance. 
The architect is generally concerned more with the 
last two of these functions than with the first, 
except for buildings of a common type. The first, 
however, is fully as important as the others, if not more 
important; and the modem skyscrapers, are really 
engineering structures of enormous magnitude. The 
building of such structures again illustrates the neces- 
sity for experience and judgment as well as theory. 
The mere determination of the loads to be assumed on 
such a building is very uncertain. Shall a building 
be designed on the supposition that every floor is 
simultaneously loaded with the maximum load that 
can never come upon it, and that at the same time a 
tornado is blowing, in which the wind has the greatest 
velocity ever recorded; or shall some allowance be 
made, and if so, what, for the fact that these circum- 
stances would never occur at the same time.? This 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 83 

illustrates the fact that structural engineering, al- 
though it may appear to depend upon formulae and 
theories which can be worked out mathematically, is 
in reality in a large measure uncertain, on account of 
the uncertainty of the data to be assumed. There are 
also uncertainties regarding the workmanship and the 
effect of workmanship upon the stresses which will 
exist in the material. An error of a fraction of an 
inch in the length of a member of a bridge may 
make a very great diff'erence in the stresses existing 
under a given load. A blind adherence to formulae 
is just as bad as a blind trust in experience. The two 
must be combined with judgment and the ability to get 
the results desired. 

High structures have had a fascination to mankind 
from the earliest times, since the building of the Tower 
of Babel or earlier. The Colossus of Rhodes, a bronze 
statue 105 feet high, erected about 280 years before 
the Christian era, is said to have required 12 years in 
construction, and was regarded as one of the seven 
wonders of the world. The Pyramid of Cheops, with 
a height of 484 feet, was of much greater antiquity 
and exceeded in height all other structures erected by 
man up to the year 1240, when the spire of the old 
St. Paul's Cathedral in London reached a height of 
520 feet; this was destroyed in, 1561. The Cathedral 
of Cologne was completed in 1880 with a height of 511 
feet, and the Washington Monument in 1884 with a 
height of 555 feet, and this was the highest structure 
until the construction of the Eiffel Tower, completed 



84 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

in 1888, which reached a height of 984* feet. Soon 
after this time, however, the construction of sky- 
scrapers began in the United States, culminating in the 
erection of the Woolworth Building, which has 51 
stories and reaches a height of 792 feet, being the 
highest structure in the world with the exception of the 
Eiifel Tower. In New York City alone there are 35 
buildings above 300 feet in height and 5 over 500 feet 
in height. The frame-work of such a building is, of 
course, the province of the structural engineer. 

The recent great extension in the use of concrete 
has greatly enlarged the field of structural engineering. 
Many structures which in the past would have been 
made of steel or wood are now made of this new mate- 
rial, which acts according to laws determined by a 
combination of theory and experiment, and very differ- 
ent from those governing the use of the older mate- 
rials. Indeed, some structural engineers now make a 
specialty of concrete work, which is used in the con- 
struction of bridges, even those of considerable span, 
and in buildings of all kinds. 

Grain elevators aiford an example of a kind of struc- 
ture which may even become a specialty in structural 
engineering. A former student of the writer happened 
to be drawn into this kind of work, and is now engaged 
as a consulting engineer in the design and construction 
almost exclusively of grain elevators in all parts of this 
country and in foreign countries as well. 

It will be seen from this outline that the field of 
structural engineering is very large and is constantly 



BEANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 85 

expanding. It is one of the specialized branches of 
engineering, and the speciaHst in it finds opportunities 
for the application of his ability in connection with all 
branches of engineering and constructive work. 

7. Municipal Engineering 

This is not a distinct branch of the profession, but 
is a combination of several of those that have been 
described. The business of a municipal corporation, 
like that of any other, — or even more so than that of 
most corporations — is largely engineering. This is evi- 
dent upon consideration, and it is further indicated by 
the fact that under the city manager form of opera- 
tion the city manager is often, if not in the majority of 
cases, a civil engineer. The first city of large size to 
adopt this form of operation, Dayton, Ohio, chose as 
city manager Mr. H. M. Waite, whose training and 
practice had been that of a civil engineer ; and his suc- 
cessor, Mr. J. E. Barlow, is another. Both are former 
students of the writer. 

The municipal engineer generally has charge of all 
city engineering work, including water work, sewers, 
sewage disposal, bridges, streets, roads and pavements, 
and sometimes urban transportation, generally with 
assistants who are specialists in different departments. 
The city engineer should therefore be a man of broad 
outlook, and large experience. His work is very varied. 
If he needs special advice on any of his problems, he 
calls in consulting engineers who are specialists ; but 
he must have a broad grasp upon all of his problems. 



86 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The position of city engineer is often not recognized 
as it should be, politics often governs the selection of 
the man, and he is subject to the vicissitudes of poli- 
tical changes. Hence the postion is not generally 
sought by engineers of eminence. Yet there are notable 
exceptions; and not infrequently the city engineer is 
the official least likely to be affected by a change in ad- 
ministration, holding his position continuously no mat- 
ter what party is in power. The late William Jackson, 
of Boston, was such a man, having been continuously 
in the employ of the city for 37 years, the last 25 years 
as City Engineer. 

The city engineer frequently has a leading part to 
play in city planning, which has to do with the laying 
out of streets, the restriction of occupations to certain 
districts, and city improvements in general. In such 
ways the city engineer often has the opportunity to do 
things of the greatest benefit to the city, though they 
may not be fully appreciated at the time. The director 
of City Planning of Rochester, N. Y., Mr. E. A. Fisher, 
for many years city engineer, has recently presented 
a plan whose adoption he urges, by which the city 
should purchase the abandoned Erie Canal, which pur- 
chase is provided for by law; and he shows that by 
acquiring the canal the city will become possessed of 
a right of way strip through the city which can 
easily be utilized for an urban rapid transit line for 
passenger traffic, and which can also be made to con- 
nect with all the railroads entering the city, and may so 
serve for freight distribution and collection as well. By 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 87 

this plan the transit problem will be practically solved 
for Rochester for many years to come, and if justice 
is done, Mr. Fisher will be looked upon as a public 
benefactor. 

So important is the work of the municipal engineer 
that a separate engineering association, The Society 
for Municipal Improvements was organized in 1894 
and now has some 500 members, the majority of whom 
are engineers. 

The work of the city engineer deals not only with 
construction, but also with maintenance. It also has 
to do with economic questions, such as methods of 
assessing taxes for improvements, as for streets and 
sewers, methods of condemning land, etc. ; and so it 
contributes to the cultivation of breadth of view on the 
part of the engineer, 

8. Valiuition of Properties 

Within the last two decades, what is practically a 
new branch of engineering has been developed, namely, 
that concerned with the valuation of public utility 
and other properties. This cannot be said to be a 
branch of civil engineering any more than of electrical 
or mechanical engineering, for engineers of all kinds 
are called upon to engage in it; but as civil engineers 
have gone into it to a large extent it may be referred 
to here. 

For many years it has been necessary to have ap- 
praisals made of the value of properties, either for 



88 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

purposes of raising money by the issue of securities^ 
or for purposes of sale. During the last few decades, 
however, during which time the public utilities have 
been subject to regulation by public commissions, which 
have the power to fix the rates which those utilities shall 
charge for their service, it has become necessary in 
many cases to ascertain the fair value of the proper- 
ties upon which they should be entitled to earn a fair 
return. This question has become a leading one in the 
economic discussion of the day and before courts. It 
is a question of economics and justice, as well as of 
engineering. In this field, engineering comes into con- 
tact with accounting, with economics, with law, and 
with the general question of the relations between the 
utilities and the public. It has required the services of 
a great many engineers in ascertaining the physical 
value of the properties, requiring an inventory of the 
property and the fixing of a fair price for each ele- 
ment of it. It also involves the question as to what is 
the value of a property completed and in operation 
as compared with the value of the physical items which 
make up the property, or the "bare bones" of the plant. 

This work requires the possession of a judicial atti- 
tude of mind and of the ability to analyze accounts, 
and to deal with economic questions of a somewhat 
intricate nature. 

Civil engineers have taken part largely in this work, 
and it oifers an interesting and remunerative field for 
an engineer possessed of the necessary experience and 
knowledge, and with the proper temperament. The 



BRANCHES OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 89 

Interstate Commerce Commission has for several years 
been engaged in finding the physical value of the rail- 
roads of this country. In the prosecution of this work 
the services of 1,400 engineers have been required by 
the Commission. Furthermore, the public service com- 
missions of the various states generally have engineer- 
ing departments in which there are engineers, who not 
only have to deal with questions of construction and 
maintenance and the approval of plans for new work, 
but who also have to make appraisals where needed for 
purposes of valuation. The writer has for a number of 
years given a course on this subject in Harvard Uni- 
versity, and in some other institutions instruction is 
given in it. It is not a proper field for a young and 
inexperienced man, except that a good many such men 
are often required in making the inventory of physical 
material and in collecting the other data, historical and 
otherwise, upon which a proper final judgment is to be 
passed. The subject offers a good field, however, for 
men of experience in construction who can deal with the 
economic problems which it presents. 



CHAPTER III 

QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 
FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEER 

For the successful practice of Civil Engineering, 
as of other occupations, specific qualifications of a pro- 
fessional and of a personal kind are requisite, or if not 
absolutely necessary, are at least desirable. Profes- 
sional qualifications are those qualities or acquirements 
which affect mainly his knowledge, and which, therefore, 
supply the basis for his intelligent dealing with the 
problems to be solved. Personal qualifications are 
those qualities which fit him to apply his knowledge 
properly, economically, and effectively, and so to ac- 
complish the result which his professional knowledge 
and skill indicate to be desirable or necessary. The 
two kinds of qualifications do not always go together, 
yet their union is necessary for the highest success. An 
engineer may have great professional ability, yet on 
account of the lack of some personal quality, such as 
tact or promptness, may be a miserable failure in 
certain kinds of work. On the other hand, an engineer 
possessed of all the personal qualities necessary, but 
lacking professional knowledge, such as of the prop- 
erties of the materials to be used, or the laws of nature 
applicable to the case, may find his plan or his struc- 
ture a costly failure. 

90 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 91 

Professional Qualifications 

Remembering that civil engineering consists in ap- 
plying the laws, forces, and materials of nature, eco- 
nomically, for the use and convenience of man, it is 
at once evident that the knowledge, or professional 
qualifications of the engineer, must include: 

1. A knowledge of the forces of nature, and of the 
laws governing them; in other words, a knowledge of 
natural science, logic, and mathematics. 

2. A knowledge of the materials applicable in con- 
struction. 

3. A training in those branches of knowledge which 
have to do with the economical adaptation of means to 
ends. 

4. A perception of the true relations of things, or a sense 
of proportion, which will indicate what measures or proj- 
ects that are physically possible will really conduce to the 
use and convenience of man. 

1. It will be abundantly evident, from what has 
been presented in the last chapter, that engineering 
is not an abstract science, which can be followed by a 
recluse in his study, but an intensely practical affair, 
indeed, a kind of business. The engineer must be a 
business man, not a theorist, and must conduct his 
work on business principles. As applied to any con- 
templated project, the work of the engineer consists, in 
most cases, of four parts: first, to determine whether 
anythimg should be done, and, if so, what ; second, to 
design and formulate the means to be employed in doing 
It ; third, to select and test the proper materials ; fourth, 
to carry the actual work through its various stages 



92 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERIN& 

to completion. It is therefore clear that the engineer 
should be scientifically trained, and should possess a 
knowledge of natural science and mathematics. Dif- 
ferent branches of science are required in varying 
degrees in the different branches of the profession, but 
every engineer should know, and know thoroughly, the 
fundamental principles of chemistry, physics, mathe- 
matics, and mechanics, with such knowledge of geology, 
astronomy, and biology, etc., as may be requisite for 
his particular specialty. Moreover, in order to know 
these subjects as he ought to, and to be able to draw 
his conclusions with accuracy, he must be possessed of 
the true scientific spirit and attitude of mind, loving 
the study of science for its own sake as well as for its 
applications and the material benefit they may bring 
him. 

It is particularly important that the engineer should 
possess the scientific attitude of mind. By this is 
meant the attitude which leads him to approach a 
problem entirely without prejudice, without precon- 
ceived ideas, intent only on seeking the truth, the whole 
truth, and nothing but the truth; and the willingness 
to accept the truth, when found, even if it is unpalat- 
able or may lead to the abandonment of the project 
on which he is engaged. He must even be without 
ideals, except the simple personal ones to do right, to 
injure no one, to judge not, and to do what proves 
to be best under the circumstances. He must first of 
all clearly perceive the problem which is to be solved, 
in its full extent, and without neglecting to see all the 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 93 

elements involved, in their proper proportion. Then 
he must assemble all the facts which have a bearing 
upon the solution. Then he must apply the proper 
scientific principles to those facts, and by a process 
of logical reasoning arrive at the truth. The idealist 
too often, if not generally, starts out with a precon- 
ceived idea of the result which he desires to reach. He 
omits or minimizes facts or conditions which conflict 
with those ideals, and not seldom simply succeeds in per- 
suading himself that he has demonstrated the truth of 
his preconceived ideas. Such a course is fatal. 

It must not be inferred that the engineer should 
have no imagination, for this quality, as will be here- 
after shown, is one of the most important for the 
engineer. The point is, that he must not approach his 
problem with any preconceived ideas or ideals except 
the simple ones already stated, which, indeed, should 
be the ideals or aims of every man at all times and 
under all conditions. 

Especially important is it that the engineer should 
have a logical mind so that he may reason logically 
from facts and principles. In some callings this 
quality may not he so important ; for instance, in some 
branches of business, where if a man reasons illogically 
and makes an error the injury will be suffered by him- 
self alone. But in engineering, where illogical reason- 
ing may result in the collapse of a bridge, a building, 
or a dam, with great resulting loss of life and property 
to innocent persons and not to the engineer, or in the 
failure of the project, such as a railroad or an irriga- 



94 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

tion scheme, by which many innocent investors may 
suffer great financial loss, the responsibility of the 
engineer is such that logical reasoning is of the first 
importance. The engineer must, therefore, as in the 
profession of medicine and the law, where similar 
responsibilities are present, be a logical man, and 
trained in the principles of logical thinking. 

The civil engineer must also be proficient, to the 
necessary extent, in mathematics. He should know 
thoroughly the fundamental principles of that branch 
of learning through the calculus, that is to say includ- 
ing arithmetic, plane and solid geometry, algebra, 
trigonometry, analytic geometry and the differential 
and integral calculus. But this does not mean that he 
must necessarily be what would be termed a fine mathe- 
matician, for many eminently successful engineers have 
been very far from this. Indeed, there are real dangers 
in excessive proficiency in mathematics. Mathematics 
and logic comprise the abstract sciences, that is to say, 
the sciences which may be reasoned out in the abstract, 
in the solitude of the study, without the need of ex- 
perience or contact with the concrete problems of life. 
Mathematical truths and processes may be perceived 
by the mind without experiment. The data being as- 
sumed, or the quantities to be dealt with being rep- 
resented by letters, the processes of mathematics are 
rigidly correct, and enable necessary consequences to 
be deduced from those data. 

Mathematics is a somewhat curious subject of study. 
It is a machine, and works with unerring accuracy. 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 95 

Into one end of the machine are put the data, the 
crank is turned, the machine works, and the result 
comes out with absolute correctness. But this cor- 
rectness depends entirely upon the data. It is only 
really correct if the data are correct. Put in correct 
data and a correct result will be reached; put in in- 
correct data and the result will be correspondingly in- 
correct. Moreover, a small error in the data may 
lead to a large error in the result; just as a small di- 
vergence from a straight line, when a railroad train 
takes the switch at the beginning of a curve may 
shortly direct the train in just the reverse direction. 
The mathematical machine is very interesting, in con- 
struction and operation, and the danger is that the stu- 
dent of mathematics may become so absorbed in its 
construction and operation that he loses sight of the 
importance of the data. The engineer, however, must 
be sure that his data are correct, he must see all the ele- 
ments of the problem, and must therefore see to it that 
he puts the mathematical machine to work upon correct 
and complete data. If the data are either incorrect 
or incomplete, the most elaborate mathematical analy- 
sis may be worthless. Yet the study of abstract mathe- 
matics tends to lead the mind away from a proper 
attention to data ; it tends to educate away from 
common sense. This is the reason why the finest mathe- 
maticians sometimes make the poorest engineers. The 
engineer must look upon mathematics merely as a ma- 
chine, or tool, which, with judgment, common sense, and 
clear purpose, he uses for the end in view. He must 



96 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

never be mastered or governed by it, but must make his 
own intellect its master. So in deductive logic, the 
laws governing correct reasoning are abstract and inde^ 
pendent of actual conditions. Inductive reasoning is 
based upon a collection of facts obtained by other 
means, as by observation or experiment, but the pro- 
cesses of reasoning employed are abstract, like those 
of mathematics. But engineering deals with the facts 
and problems of actual life, in which data are uncertain, 
exactness impossible, conditions shifting and variable, 
and premises generally more or less doubtful. The 
engineer must perceive the relation of these uncertain- 
ties to his problem and the results of his analytical 
deductions. In studying mathematics, as John Stuart 
Mill said, the mind must not "go to sleep over mathe- 
matical symbols.'* 

For the engineer, therefore, mathematics and logic 
must be studied as tools, and with regard to the shifting 
and uncertain character of the data. The excessive or 
improper study of mathematics in the abstract, by 
emphasizing the process rather than the broader prob- 
lems which these processes aid in solving, may therefore 
cultivate an abstract turn of mind which makes the 
student impractical or visionary, and distorts his 
point of view, leading him to suppose that a multitude 
of figures or equations constitute an accurate solution, 
rather than to cultivate the power of gaining a clear 
and practical view of the problem as a whole. In other 
words, mathematics studied in the abstract tends to 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 97 

diminish that most important faculty for the engineer, 
or, for that matter, for any one who deals with the 
actual problems of life, common sense. This is the 
reason why so many eminent engineers have known little 
of mathematics, while they have invariably possessed 
common sense in high degree. Nevertheless, mathe- 
matics is one of the most important tools of the en- 
gineer, and he should have a mathematical mind, that 
is, a mind capable of perceiving and utilizing the 
relations with which mathematics deals. He should 
certainly have a "head for figures." The great en- 
gineers who have not been mathematicians have pos- 
sessed such minds, and in many cases would have made 
good mathematicians even in the abstract sense, if they 
had been trained in this direction. 

The object of the preceding remarks has not been 
to discourage the cultivation of mathematics, or to 
disparage the great usefulness of that wonderful 
science, but to urge the point that the engineer must 
not allow his study of mathematics to become too ab- 
stract, and must continually perceive the uses and the 
practical bearings of the science. If he does not do this, 
but allows the abstract mathematical point of view to 
dominate his mind, he may become a fine mathematician 
or theorist, but he will probably find himself always oc- 
cupying subordinate positions, doing the routine work 
of calculation, or in other words, turning the crank, 
for those who have the greater grasp which enables 
them to tell him what to do. Our industries are 



98 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

full of men of this class, who are employed to do the 
routine work for the leaders who have the vision, 
imagination, common sense, and initiative. 

2. No work of engineering construction is carried 
out except by the use of some of the materials of nature, 
such as steel, wood, stone, cement, brick, paint, etc. 
These materials vary greatly in kind and quality, and 
some may be suitable for the purpose in view while 
others may be entirely unsuitable. One of the most 
important problems of the engineer is to determine the 
kind of material which is suitable for his purpose, and 
a second is to select that quality of material, of the 
kind chosen, which will be most economical. Again, he 
must know how to test the materials to be used, in 
order to assure himself that he obtains the desired 
material and so that he may reject materials that are 
inappropriate or do not conform to his specifications. 
For these reasons, a knowledge of the materials avail- 
able for engineering structures or machines is of great 
importance. This requires a knowledge of chemistry, 
physical properties, and methods of manufacture. 

Suppose a bridge is to be built. It may be of steel, 
wood, stone, or concrete, and if of steel it may be of 
steel cables or of rolled steel shapes, of carbon steel or 
nickel steel. The design and form will depend largely 
upon the material; and the resulting economy, dura- 
bility, cost of maintenance, appearance, and suitability 
for its purpose all depend upon the material selected. 
The theoretical engineer or mathematician might be 
able to make the necessary computations for any ma- 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 99 

terial which might be selected, but far more important 
is the professional and practical knowledge, together 
with the experience, which is necessary in order to make 
a proper choice of material. Further, in order to make 
sure that suitable material specified is procured, cer- 
tain physical and chemical qualities, such as strength, 
ductility, hardness, percentage of foreign elements like 
phosphorus, sulphur, etc., must be specified, and tests 
made on specimens or full size pieces, to ensure the 
desired results. All this calls for specialized knowledge, 
and some engineers confine themselves to giving advice 
and making tests of materials. 

A large proportion of the failures of engineering 
works, very likely a majority, are due to improper ma- 
terial. In some cases an entirely different material 
should have been used, while in others the particular 
material used, though proper in kind, was defective in 
some manner. Sometimes the fault lies in the workman- 
ship, by which a proper material has been injured in 
the process of manufacture or in the handling and plac- 
ing. 

So important is this branch of the science of con- 
struction that a national society has been in existence 
since 1898, which deals with it, known as the American 
Society for Testing Materials. Also, an international 
society, the Internationl Society for Testing Materials, 
and embracing in its membership representatives of 
over twenty nations, has been in existence since about 
1882, and holds extended conferences every few years 
for the discussion of methods of testing, standardiza- 



100 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

tion of tests and specifications, and the discussion of 
problems relating to engineering materials. 

The technique of this subject is difficult and compli- 
cated, and always involves more or less uncertainty. 
For instance, it has long been recognized that phos- 
phorus tends to make steel brittle when cold, and should 
be limited in amount in steel for structural purposes. 
But just where should the line be drawn? How much 
and no more is allowable? The answer cannot be stated 
with definiteness, yet it is desirable that agreement 
should be reached, in order that specifications should 
be uniform, rather than that each engineer should fol- 
low his own ideas. The same applies to many other 
requirements, both chemical and physical. The work 
of the societies above named is done through the medium 
of committees, on which both manufacturers and users 
are represented, and consists largely in formulating 
standard requirements which conform to experience 
and good practice, which are generally adopted, and 
which are modified from time to time as experience and 
the progress of the art may indicate. 

This branch of the profession affords an illustra- 
tion of the remarks above made with reference to mathe- 
matics, for mathematics has little to do with this im- 
portant part of the work of the engineer, which is gov- 
erned mainly by experience, common sense, a knowledge 
of chemical and physical properties, and the mechanical 
ability to devise means and methods for making tests 
which will adequately represent those properties. 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 101 

3. The third professional requisite for the engineer 
is that which will enable him to secure econoiny. 

This is an essential for good engineering. Indeed, 
the engineer has been described as a man who makes two 
blades of grass grow where one grew before, but another 
definition more applicable here is that he is a man who 
does for one dollar what any fool can do for two. 
Almost anyone can either do engineering work, or hire 
it done; but in engineering, as in other things, few can 
do just the right thing, and in the most economical 
way. It may sound materialistic and unidealistic, but 
the question of economy properly comes into almost 
every affair of life, even into charity. 

It is comparatively easy to build a bridge, although 
it requires skill and knowledge, but more important 
than the question — how to build it — are the questions 
— where to build it, when to build it, and whether to 
build it at all. If a bridge is built in an improper loca- 
tion it may not only fail to serve its purpose properly, 
but great expense and inconvenience may result. If an 
irrigation or a hydro-electric project is embarked upon 
without a careful consideration, not only of the cost, 
but of the market and all the other economic elements 
entering into the problem, it may prove unprofitable 
and the investors may lose their money. 

Not only must estimates of cost be made in connec- 
tion with almost every engineering project, but the 
study of engineering economics often requires that 
facts be compared which can only be expressed in in- 



102 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

commensurable terms. Elements must be weighed 
against each other which are entirely different in char- 
acter. For instance, if we ask which is the greater, 
6 feet or two meters, there is no difficulty in giving 
an answer ; but if we ask which is the more important, 
10 feet or five dollars, or which is the more valuable, 
truthfulness or beefsteak, the reply is not entirely 
obvious. These illustrations are not fanciful. In 
engineering work it is frequently necessary to make 
comparisons between things which have to do with 
our physical well-being and those which have to do with 
our economic, or even with our moral or spiritual well- 
being. Although these things are incommensurable, 
they must be compared and an opinion formed from the 
comparison. In planning a station for a subway for 
urban transportation, one design may require pas- 
sengers to walk on the average a certain number of feet 
and to climb a certain number of stairs, while another 
design may cost more but require less walking and less 
climbing. Here a comparison must be made between 
dollars and feet, or between cost and physical exertion. 
Engineers have sometimes endeavored to meet such cases 
by a fanciful endeavor to express the comparison in 
commensurable terms. It would be possible perhaps to 
compute the value of the shoe leather that would be 
saved in a year if all the passengers using the station 
saved the given distance according to the more ex- 
pensive plan and to compare this saving with the in- 
terest on the added expenditure. It is not infrequent 
in problems involving rapid transit, to compare the cost 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 103 

with the time saved. One plan may cost a certain sum 
more than another plan, but it may involve a saving, 
let us say, of three minutes for each passenger. Some 
people endeavor in such a case to compute the total 
saving in time by multiplying three minutes by the total 
number of trips in a year, alleging that this is the total 
time saved; and then estimating the value of this time 
on the basis of the average wage or earning power of 
a passenger. In this case it is endeavored to make the 
comparison between dollars and minutes by reducing 
them to commensurable terms. 

Such comparisons are generally made by those who 
find their judgment unable to deal with the subject in 
any other way — who cannot compare except by meas- 
uring or weighing as they have been accustomed to do. 
Such persons often do not realize that the comparisons 
they make in that way may be entirely deceptive. A 
Japanese, riding on the New York subway, and being 
told that by making certain changes from one train to 
another a saving of fifteen minutes might be made in 
going from one point to another is said to have asked 
his informant — "And what do you do with the fifteen 
minutes.'"' If spent in the train it is not necessarily 
lost, but may be utilized, if only in meditation, like 
any other fifteen minutes in the day. Also such com- 
parisons between cost and saving of time often make 
the mistake of not considering whether the individuals 
who make the saving in time are the same individuals 
who would bear the increased cost. 

No special directions or specifications can be given 



104 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

with reference to the economic sense which must be 
possessed by the engineer. It may be called a special 
sense and involves the use of judgment, and above all 
things, a well balanced mind. If it is urged that an 
escalator or moving stairway should be placed at a 
subway station so that people would not have to walk 
upstairs, and if the inconvenience suffered by an aged 
or infirm person in climbing the stairs is portrayed in 
vivid colors, it is necessary to decide how much con- 
sideration should be given to such an argument, and 
it may also be inquired whether such aged or infirm 
persons have elevators in their own houses, or why 
they go down town at all, or how far they walk or 
climb in the department stores. If safety appliances 
are urged for railroads or industrial establishments 
because loss of life sometimes results if they are absent, 
it is necessary to consider what expenditure is justi- 
fiable in order to prevent the loss of 'a certain number 
of lives per annum; in other words, what is the value 
of a human life to the public, or to an employer. There 
will always be found people who seem to think that any 
expenditure is justified in such a case provided that 
expenditure is paid by somebody else. 

The economic sense, therefore, is intimately con- 
nected with the fourth and last of the professional re- 
quirements which have been named as requisite for the 
engineer. 

4. This requirement is, in brief, a sense of propor- 
tion, or a proper mental balance. 

This is an essential requirement in any walk of life, 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 105 

but especially in the case of a man who has to do with 
the consideration or management of large enterprises. 
The ability to observe correctly, the faculty of getting 
all the facts and of knowing when all of the pertinent 
facts have been collected, the ability to reason from 
those facts, the possession of conservatism and calm- 
ness of mind, the lack of sentiment, the absence of a 
stubborn persistence in holding to a previously formed 
opinion in the face of proof of its error, and the faculty 
of seeing different things in proper proportion and 
weighing them fairly against each other are all essen- 
tial to a well balanced mind. An engineer may possess 
technical knowledge and great mathematical ability, 
but without balance he ought never to be a leader, and 
his judgment in large matters will be worth little or 
nothing. 

This faculty can be cultivated like any other. To 
cultivate it requires reading, study, meditation and 
contact with other men. The study of history and 
biography are especially valuable, particularly the 
study of human failures. The engineer may always 
learn more from the study of failures than from the 
study of successes, if he will carefully consider the 
causes of the failure; and if he has the faculty of as- 
similating that study in such a way that he can make 
his own the experience of other men, he can go far to 
develop a sense of proportion. Most men learn only 
by experience, and while experience is the best teacher, 
it is a very costly one. The advice given by old and 
experienced men may be most valuable, but it is too 



106 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

often disregarded by the young, who think they know 
it all and who can only learn by their own mistakes, 
and so the old continue to warn and to advise and the 
young continue to disregard and to suffer. 

As the engineer deals with the applications of sci- 
ence to the affairs of men, he must be above all a prac- 
tical man. He must not be a pure theorist, a dreamer 
or a visionary. He must see in a mathematical for- 
mula a meaning and not simply an accumulation of 
letters. He must know his scientific principles, but he 
is not an engineeer unless he can apply them. 

The engineer must also have a business sense, re- 
membering that engineering is not simply utilizing the 
forces of nature for the benefit of man, but utilizing 
them economically and properly. His work requires 
financial and business ability, combined with a clear 
insight into the practical relations of things. If he 
is to build a railroad, he must study the manufactur- 
ing and economic conditions affecting the country 
through which it is to pass ; he must consider the traffic 
on existing roads, the relative importance of the cities, 
whether there is a possibility of increasing the agri- 
cultural or manufacturing product, whether his line 
should run in a comparatively straight line between 
two towns or whether it should be diverted in order to 
tap smaller towns or whether those smaller towns 
should be reached by branches from the main line. 
He should have the large view. He has the opportu- 
nity to do worse than waste the money of his employers. 

After his work is decided upon, he must draw up 



QUALIEICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 107 

contracts for its execution, make monthly estimates 
of how much has been completed, certify payments to 
the contractor, settle disputes, and in general attend 
to all the business, excepting legal matters, connected 
with the carrying out of the enterprise. He must be 
an organizer, and must know how large a force is 
necessary to carry on the work, and how to dispose 
it to the best advantage and with the greatest economy. 
He must, therefore, be a student of men and must know 
how to get along with them smoothly and to get the 
most work from them. 

The engineer not only applies the materials and 
resources of nature, but he must know how to conserve 
-them. The natural resources of this country are being 
wasted in an unexampled manner. Our forests have 
been largely destroyed and our fuels are being rapidly 
used up. Not only in applying the materials and 
forces of nature to the use of man, but in conserving 
them so far as is possible so that they may serve future 
generations, the engineer acts as the main element in 
the progress and permanence of civilization. 

Personal Qualifications 

In considering the personal qualifications which an 
engineer should possess it is difficult to make a dis- 
tinction between those which are particularly neces- 
sary for the engineer, and those which are necessary 
for success in any field of endeavor. Such qualifica- 
tions as character, promptness, tact, good manners, 



108 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

patience, perseverance, system, power of concentration, 
self-confidence, respect for others, and many others 
that could be named, are requisite for the highest suc- 
cess in any field. There are some, however, which, while 
also requisite to greater or less degree in any field, may 
be specially mentioned as desirable for the engineer. 
These are the following: 



(1) 


Judgment 


(2) 


Balance 


(3) 


A trained mind 


(4) 


Experience 


(5) 


Initiative 


(6) 


Good health 


(7) 


Knowledge. 



(1) Judgment. Judgment is one of the most im- 
portant qualifications for any man. It is especially 
so for the engineer who has habitually to decide be- 
tween different projects or diiferent ways of doing 
things. Its importance to him cannot be over-esti- 
mated. It can be acquired but little through a college 
course, but comes mainly from experience and an intui- 
tive ability to see straight. 

(2) Balance. The importance of balance has been 
already referred to. It consists in ability to see things 
of different kinds in the right proportion, neither ex- 
aggerating the importance of unimportant things, or 
minimizing the importance of important things. It 
cannot be measured and the writer can give no rules 
for its acquirement other than those which have been 
briefly mentioned above. A balanced man must be 
unprejudiced. He must have the mental courage to 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 109 

arrive at any conclusion to which the facts necessarily 
lead. Personal honesty is not a guarantee of balance. 
As Lecky says, "There is such a thing as an honest 
man with a dishonest mind. There are men who are 
wholly incapable of willful, deliberate untruthfulness, 
but who have the habit of quibbling with their convic- 
tions and by skillful casuistry persuading themselves 
that what they wish is right." The balanced man does 
not pursue impractical ideals. He does not start out 
by assuming the object at which he wishes to aim. He 
realizes that he cannot determine upon the aim until 
he has studied the facts and found out what is prac- 
ticable. He is not the slave of any moral rules. He 
realizes that every virtue, if misapplied, may become 
a vice, or as Shakespeare says : 

"Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied." 

He realizes that circumstances alter cases — ^he is not 
a slave of sentiment. He realizes the necessity of com- 
promise, and that if he cannot get what he thinks is 
the best, it is generally better to get the best thing 
possible rather than to get nothing. He realizes that 
the most honest and well intentioned men may be the 
worst advisers and may do more real harm than the 
self seeker. The French have a witty saying that 
"Virtue is more dangerous than vice, because it is not 
subject to the restraints of conscience," and there is 
an old saying quoted by Cicero that the "extreme of 
right is the extreme of wrong.'* 

Mental courage, or the ability to face and accept 



110 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

unpalatable conclusions is essential for balance. The 
balanced man is calm and quiet in speech, not argu- 
mentative, and not disposed to express his opinions 
with dogmatism. He realizes always the limitations of 
his own knowledge and the uncertainties surrounding 
every problem with which he deals, and he is not afraid 
to alter his opinion when new facts which justify it 
come to his attention. 

(3) A Trained Mind. The engineer should have a 
trained mind, that is to say, a mind which functions 
logically and properly when directed to any subject 
that it is necessary to consider. This means, as fre- 
quently expressed, the ability to think straight. The 
man with a trained mind is possessed of a machine 
which he can direct to any problem that comes before 
him. When directed to such a problem his mind will 
know how to attack it, where to get the facts that are 
requisite, when and where to get the advice and assist- 
ance of other men, and will be able to arrive at correct 
conclusions. The man with a trained mind is a safer 
man, even in dealing with a problem that he has never 
thought of before, than the expert in that subject if 
without a trained mind. 

A trained mind knows how to study. It can take up 
a subject that it has never before approached and it 
knows how to go about it to master it. The engineer 
has to deal with so many different kinds of subjects, 
and so many different considerations enter into the so- 
lutions of his problems, that without a trained mind 



QUALIFICATIONS NECESSARY OR DESIRABLE 111 

he becomes a mere routine underling, simply carrying 
out the directions of others. 

(4) Experience. Experience is necessary for the 
engineer. The young engineer must be prepared to 
spend years gaining by experience the knowledge of 
materials and of methods of handling men and doing 
work that are necessary for his later success. There is 
a great difference between men in their ability to as- 
similate experience. Some can do so but slowly and 
require to learn everything by paying for it at a high 
price. Others can assimilate the experience of others 
as if it were their own. For the cultivation of experi- 
ence, as above stated, a study of history, biography 
and engineering failures are especially valuable. 

(5) Initiative. The engineer must have initiative. 
He is often called upon to make a quick decision, to 
meet a new problem, or to do something that he has 
never done before. He must be resourceful. He must 
not depend too much on books, but must realize the 
limitations and even the danger of mere book learning. 

(6) Good Health. Good health, while not essential, 
is a very desirable quality for a civil engineer. His 
work, as already stated, is largely in the open air. He 
cannot gain the necessary experience in engineering 
construction without as a rule undergoing some physi- 
cal hardships, and often submitting to exposure. Good 
health will be a great asset to him. It can be culti- 
vated, of course, by abstemiousness, regular habits, 
temperance and self-restraint. 



112 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEEEING 

(7) Knowledge. It may seem strange to put knowl- 
edge the last on the list of the qualities requisite for 
the engineer, and yet John Locke stated the objects of 
education in their relative rank as follows: 1, virtue; 
2, wisdom ; 3, good breeding ; 4, learning. Our colleges, 
and even our usual habit of mind, place learning in the 
wrong position. It is really subordinate to many other 
things, and while necessary for the engineer, as will 
be discussed in the chapter on Education, it will not 
alone go very far to make him successful. It is a 
requisite, but without the other requisites it is of minor 
importance. 



CHAPTER IV 

EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 

The engineer must be educated in the fundamental 
principles which underlie the practice of his profes- 
sion. He must get this education either in the college 
or technical school or out of it. It is possible for him 
to get it in either way. Probably a majority of civil 
engineers have not had the benefit of a college tech- 
nical training, but they have been men possessed of 
unusual brains and common sense, and with the ability 
to study by themselves, like Abraham Lincoln, who had 
less than three months of schooling, all told, and like 
Robert Stephenson, who had less than six months in 
college. A technical college education, however, is a 
great advantage, and at the present time is almost a 
necessity, provided the student can take advantage of 
what it offers. It offers only an opportunity. The 
college cannot make a man an engineer, but it can 
afford the opportunity to gain that knowledge and 
discipline which will enable him to advance in his pro- 
fession much more rapidly than he could without it. 
President Draper finely expresses the value of a higher 
education when he says: "With an independent, sane, 
balanced character, having the elements of success any- 
way, the advantage of a college training cannot be 
overestimated." 

113 



114 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The first engineering school in this country was the 
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, which was 
organized in 1824. The Lawrence Scientific School and 
the Sheflield Scientific School were organized in 1847, 
and these were followed during the next twenty years 
by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1865, 
and some others. Since that time, the number of 
schools at which an engineering training may be ob- 
tained has greatly increased, and almost all our Uni- 
versities have engineering departments. 

In addition to a technical engineering education, it 
is, of course, extremely desirable that the engineer, like 
any other professional man, should have an acquaint- 
ance, and not a superficial one, with history, language, 
and literature, with economic and social problems, and 
with the natural sciences. He will not get this ac- 
quaintance properly without discipline. He will not 
get it by taking college courses which he considers 
easy, and doing just enough work in them to get 
through. The true object of education cannot be 
attained without eff^ort. When the work of a student 
is easy for him, it should be changed. It should always 
be within his powers, but it should require continued 
effort. The easy path does not give discipline; it is 
the steep and rugged path which requires the effort 
that develops the powers of mind and body. And this 
is not, as a rule, the path chosen by college students. 

The case is different in the professional school. 
There the young man, if he has good stuff in him, 
seems to realize that he is laying the foundations for 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 115 

his life work, and he works with energy and application. 
It is not uncommon to hear young men who have gone 
through the college of arts and the professional school 
say that they did not work in college, but only began 
to work when they reached the professional school. It 
should not be possible to make such a statement truly. 
The college should require work just as much as the 
professional school, though of a different kind. The 
late General Francis A. Walker, long President of the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, comparing 
the Institute course with the usual college course, used 
to say that "the Institute is a place for men to work, 
not for boys to play." The same ought to be true of 
the college. 

When Robert Stephenson's friends, observing his 
fine mental qualities, urged his father, George Stephen- 
son, to give him a college education, his father said 
that it was not his wish "to make his son a gentleman." 
He added "Robert must wark, wark, as I hae warked 
afore him," indicating clearly his impression that the 
college course did not mean "work"* Nevertheless, he 
sent Robert to the University of Edinburgh for one 
term, or a little less than six months, which was all the 
college education that this man, probably the most 
noted engineer of the last century, ever received; but 
he knew how to study and did study almost every spare 
minute. In college he was "resolute in his attendance 
at lectures, and declined to enjoy for an hour the so- 

* Some wit has given a definition of the term "college-bred" as 
"a four-years' loaf." 



116 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

ciety of a friend who paid him a flying visit, in order 
that he might be present at the address of the Pro- 
fessor of Natural Philosophy." His biographer re- 
marks, regarding the University of Edinburgh at that 
time, "brilliant as the assembly of professors in Edin- 
burgh then was, the educational system of the Univer- 
sity was faulty and the students were allowed to pursue 
their own courses, without discipline, and in some cases 
without encouragement." This seems to justify the 
father's impression, and the biographer has mentioned 
the very thing which justified it, when he said that the 
students were "allowed to pursue their own courses 
without discipline." But even this could not spoil 
Robert Stephenson, of whom his biographer says, "in 
study he was perhaps intemperate, but in his diet he 
was habitually spare and moderate." All through his 
life, as we read of it, we find him studying, taking les- 
sons at one time in Mineralogy and Assaying, prepara- 
tory to going to South America as manager of a mining 
company at the age of twenty-one; studying Mathe- 
matics, Physics, and Mechanics at every opportunity; 
and in this way laying the foundations for his success, 
even without a college education, either in arts or in 
engineering. 

Engineering is a profession, and the students of engi- 
neering are professional students. If they take a col- 
lege technical course, they should be imbued with the 
professional spirit and should not be permitted to in- 
dulge themselves in the lax methods so common among 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 117 

college students who are candidates for the A.B. 
degree. 

The professional school, however, deals as a rule 
only with professional subjects, or those intimately re- 
lated to them. How, then, is the engineer to acquire 
the general knowledge of language, literature, history, 
economics, etc., which is necessary in order that he may 
be a broadly cultivated man, able to meet members of 
any profession on equal terms? 

Training for the other learned professions, divinity, 
law, and medicine, has generally required students to 
take a college course in arts, or part of such a course, 
before entering the professional school, recognizing the 
fact that the professional man should have broader 
training than in the details or technique of his pro- 
fession. There are, however, many schools of law and 
medicine in which a college degree is not required for 
entrance, and some of our most eminent professional 
men are graduates of such schools. Engineering 
schools, however, have as a rule not required a pre- 
liminary college course, but have admitted young men 
having essentially the same preparation as those en- 
tering college, giving them an engineering degree after 
four years. In order that the students in engineering 
may be held up to the discipline of a professional school 
and not allowed to acquire the lax habits so common in 
college, the engineering school of a university has some- 
times been segregated from the college of arts like the 
other professional schools. Some of our most success- 



118 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

ful engineering schools, too, have been from the begin- 
ning independent of any college, devoting themselves 
almost wholly to technical training, like the Rensselaer 
Polytechnic Institute, the Worcester Polytechnic In- 
stitute, the Case School, the Stevens Institute of Tech- 
nology, and the Massachusetts Institute of Tech- 
nology. 

The fact that a preliminary college course in arts 
has not generally been required for a degree in engi- 
neering explains some things with reference to the sta- 
tus of the engineer in society. Members of the other 
professions, while frankly admitting that they did no 
serious work until they reached the professional school, 
nevertheless in many cases arrogate to themselves su- 
perior qualifications on account of their college course, 
and look down upon the engineer who has received his 
degree after only four years of professional study. 
This attitude, however, is clearly unjustifiable. It is 
not the college course which makes a man, but only 
what power, discipline, and inspiration he gets out of 
it. And many a man with no college course at all is 
far superior in every way to many college graduates. 
The writer has taught in an independent technical 
school and in a university, and he has not found that 
graduates from a college of arts as a rule are able to 
speak or write the English language more correctly, 
or have any better disciplined minds, or fare any better 
informed on general topics, than the graduates of our 
engineering schools. Certainly, four years in college, 
during which time a man fritters away his time and 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 119 

acquires habits of indolence, injure him for future 
work, notwithstanding the scraps of knowledge which 
he may have succeeded in memorizing. 

A young man who desires to fit himself for the engi- 
neering profession has obviously three courses open to 
him: (1) he may take a general college course first, 
and then enter the engineering school, just as he would 
the law school; (2) he may enter the engineering school 
of a university, or an independent engineering school, 
and complete his professional training in four years; 
or, (3) he may enter an engineering school, and take a 
course longer than four years, .either by taking the 
regular four-year course first and then a post-graduate 
course as a candidate for a higher degree, or by ar- 
ranging his work to cover more than four years and 
making it include such liberal studies as he may desire. 
The writer is acquainted with a great number of men 
who have pursued each of these courses, and it is not 
at all apparent that those who have pursued the first 
course have as a rule succeeded better in their profes- 
sion, or attained positions of more influence in the 
community, than those who have pursued the others. 

The first plan — that of taking first a college course 
in arts and following it by a professional course — ^is 
considered by many eminent authorities to be the best 
and the ideal arrangement. Admitting, as every one 
must, the importance of acquiring a thorough ac- 
quaintance and discipline in liberalizing studies, as well 
as in strictly professional studies, it raises the ques- 
tion whether it is better to take first a course in which 



120 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

these liberal studies are concentrated to the exclusion 
of technical studies, and to follow it with a course in 
which the latter are concentrated to the exclusion of 
the former, or to take one course in which both kinds 
of studies are carried along simultaneously. On the 
one hand it is urged that when pursuing professional 
studies the student should concentrate his attention on 
them, and that liberal studies would distract him. On 
the other hand it is urged that the pursuit of liberal 
studies alone will not be undertaken with seriousness 
and purpose, and that if such studies are to be of bene- 
fit they should not be taken and then all interest in 
them abandoned, but that interest in them should be 
carried along simultaneously with strictly professional 
work. Much depends, no doubt, upon the individual 
student. Some like change of study, and can do better 
work when their minds are relieved from the tension 
of one subject by turning to an entirely different one: 
while others can do better by concentrating for a long 
time on one kind of subject. 

The strongest objection to this first plan lies in the 
unsatisfactory results of the usual college course in 
arts. Those who urge this plan are generally idealists, 
whose habit it is to form first in their own minds a 
conception of what ought to be best, and then conclude 
that it is best, without much regard to facts. If the 
usual college course produced the results that it ought 
to produce, this plan would perhaps be the best, for 
those who can aff^ord the time. But unfortunately, the 
lax habits too often acquired in college, and dissatis- 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 121 

faction with the usual results achieved, have been ad- 
mitted by some of the most eminent authorities. Sen- 
ator Lodge, for instance, in his "Early Memories" says, 
referring to Ms course in college, "But in all my four 
years I never really studied anything, never had my 
mind aroused to any exertion or to anything resem- 
bling active thought until in my senior year I stumbled 
into the course in mediaeval history, given by Henry 
Adams." And again he says, "so it comes to pass that 
I think with sorrow of my own folly and entertain 
serious doubts as to the perfection of that unrestricted 
freedom of election which gave my folly scope and 
opportunity." 

Abraham Flexner, in his volume, "The American 
College," says, "Now as a matter of fact, the college 
does not even rise to the accepted standards of the 
commercial world, to whose demoralizing influence its 
scholarly ideals are occasionally alleged to have suc- 
cumbed. For college standards of success are actually 
below those that prevail outside. A youth may win 
his degree on a showing that would in an office cost him 
his desk." And again, "the important thing is to 
realize that the American college is deficient, and un- 
necessarily deficient, alike in earnestness and in peda- 
gogical intelligence; that in consequence our college 
students are, and for the most part, emerge, flighty, 
superficial, and immature, lacking as a class concen- 
tration, seriousness, and thoroughness." 

President Pritchett, of the Carnegie Foundation, 
says, "The two objections generally brought against 



122 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

the college to-day are vagueness of aim and lack of 
intellectual stamina." 

President Jacob G. Schurman, of Cornell, in one of 
his reports, said, "The college is without clear-cut no- 
tions of what a liberal education is and how it is to be 
secured, . . . and the pity of it is that this is not a 
local or special disability, but a prevalency affecting 
every college of arts in America." 

Professor Charles M. Gayley, in his "Idols of Edu- 
cation," is very severe, as the following extracts show: 
"The boy enters our colleges *a badly damaged article,' 
one-sidedly prepared, or not prepared at all, he goes 
through college accumulating courses, but not educa- 
tion; desperately selecting studies least foreign to his 
slender capacity for assimilation, or most easy to slur, 
or most likely to turn to superficial ends. He is by no 
means always lazy, nor oblivious that now is the chance 
of his life; but he has no core of knowledge to which 
the facts he fumbles may cling, no keen-edged linguistic 
or scientific tools with which to cut to the heart of the 
matter; no memory trained and enriched, no taste, 
no imagination, no judgment balanced by frequent 
trial, no habits of remorseless application. He has 
bluff but not confidence, he has promise but not power; 
the subjects of his study have not been correlated. The 
goal has been neither discipline nor intrinsic worth. 
He has probably never studied one thing thoroughly. 
He has not been guided; he has not been taught; he 
has not conquered work. He has been distracted; he 
has been amused." 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 123 

And again, "Our graduates are characterized by 
lack of information, lack of grasp, lack of culture. 
This is no prejudiced account of the case. It is at- 
tested by our leaders at the bar, on the bench, in the 
pulpit and in the hospital, and by our captains of 
industry. Also by educated foreigners." 

And again, "Save so far as a general choice between 
industrial or academic schooling is conceded, the pupil 
should encounter no elective system until he is able 
to enter upon the true university course which now 
begins with the beginning of the junior year, and even 
then a system so rationalized that the perils do not 
outweigh the privileges." . . . "The long and short of 
it is that we, educators, do not educate. We are fud- 
dled with educational fads ; and we fuddle the schools 
in turn." 

Professor W. G. Sumner of Yale, said, "I never see 
anything more pitiable than the helpless floundering in 
a new subject of a young man far on in his education 
who has never yet learned to use his mind." 

Professor Charles H. Grandgent, of Harvard, in his 
address entitled "The Dark Ages," says, "Students 
are always ready to do anything but study. Study is 
hard and distasteful, because our boys and girls have 
never been used to mental concentration. Any other 
activity, be it athletics or ^social service,' seems to them 
less painful, hence more profitable. . . . You must 
have noticed how very difficult it has become for col- 
lege students not only to write but to read their 
mother tongue. We give them books to study, and the 



124 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEEBING 

boys, for the most part, obligingly plow through them, 
for they are good fellows ; but they are no wiser after 
than before. ... It is pitiful to see the agonies that 
the ordinary college student has to suffer, if he is 
obliged to learn anything outright. It is amazing to see 
how readily he forgets the things which he is told, and 
which, for the moment, he apparently understands." 

According to the above testimony, and from the 
writer^s experience of more than thirty years, in plain 
English, the "thorough training" which is so often 
claimed, by educators, to have been obtained by col- 
lege and engineering graduates, is a fallacy. A few 
men get it, all have the opportunity to get it, but the 
majority do not get it. It depends on the student. 
The diploma is no guarantee that he has it. 

The historian. Gibbon, referring to the ignoble son 
of one of the best of the Roman emperors, who had 
given his son the best educational advantages, makes 
the striking remark, "But the power of instruction is 
seldom of much efficacy, except in those happy dispo- 
sitions in which it is almost superfluous." In other 
words, the men who will get an education anyway will 
profit by schooling; others will seldom get much from it. 

There is much misapprehension with regard to edu- 
cation and to its aims. The word "education" means, 
by derivation, drawing or leading out ; that is, it should 
draw out and develop the inherent powers of the man. 
By many, however, it seems to be considered to mean 
to put in^ The teacher is supposed to put knowledge 
into the mind of the student, and the student's work 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 125 

is often gauged by the amount which he can retain or 
remember. Such education is of little value. 

The usual college course offers abundant examples 
of this. The writer believes, after many years of ex- 
perience, that only a small proportion of the students 
taking such a course have their main interest in their 
work. The}^ are there because their parents send them 
and pay the bills. Their main interest is in other 
things than their studies — in the social activities, in 
athletics, in the football games, in the college life, in 
having a good time, and so on. They have no plan 
and seem to be wandering about aimlessly among the 
courses that are offered. If, as is usually the case, they 
can choose their courses, they too often select the easy 
ones. They talk with other men who have taken these 
courses and if they are told that a course is easy, they 
will "take a chance" at it. Their object is, as a rule, 
not to gain discipline but to get through; to do only 
enough to "put it over." This is, of course, demoral- 
izing, and such an attitude does not fit a young man 
for the problems of life. A friend of the writer re- 
cently said that his son, at college, had asked for an 
automobile, and upon being refused had complained 
and said that every boy in his fraternity had one. A 
father who gives his boy in college an automobile to 
play with commits a crime, and does not deserve to 
have a son who amounts to anything. Moreover, he 
is helping to demoralize many other boys who have 
higher aims and real desire to profit by their college 
course. 



126 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

The aim of the college course is frequently said to be 
"culture." If I may define culture, I may admit that 
it should be the aim, but if the word means only an 
external smoothness and roundness of outline without 
regard to intrinsic qualities, it is a sham. Professor 
Sumner speaks of a kind of culture which he says 
might be called sapolio culture "because it consists 
of putting a high polish on plated ware." He adds, 
"there seems great danger lest this kind may come to 
be the sort aimed at by those who regard culture as the 
end of education." If I may define culture as a system 
of training which brings into intelligent activity all 
the best powers of the mind and of the body, which 
teaches how to study, and which develops in the stu- 
dent the power of attacking a new subject or a new 
problem, I would admit this sort of culture to be the 
aim of education; but this is discipline and not what 
is usually termed culture. 

Professor Baynes said, "The true end of all higher 
education is not so much to fill the mind as to quicken 
and train its power, not so much to impart knowledge 
as to awaken thought." 

All this should not be considered necessarily deroga- 
tory to the college itself. Much depends upon the par- 
ticular college. In some, especially those not fre- 
quented by large numbers of sons of wealtliy parents, 
the standards of accomplishment and the earnestness 
of the students may be high ; while in others they may 
be low. What has been said is merely a statement of 
what are believed to be facts. Moreover, if these facts 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 127 

are as stated, the responsibility often rests more with 
the students and their parents than it does with the 
college, which really offers opportunity for discipline 
and training which are not embraced. Not infre- 
quently parents send their sons to college admitting 
that they do so for social reasons ; and the bad habits 
which young men frequently acquire are due largely to 
lack of discipline at home. It is unquestionably easier 
for a parent or a teacher to let a young man have his 
own way rather than to enforce discipline, but parents 
who pursue such a course are only laying up sorrow 
for themselves as well as for their sons. And teachers 
who pursue such a course are injuring their institu- 
tion and their own reputation as well as their students. 
There is, no doubt, much that is beneficial in the "col- 
lege life" that a young man gets in college. The inti- 
mate association with his fellows, the opportunities of 
forming lasting friendships, the insight into individual 
character, the atmosphere surrounding a body of 
young men pursuing varying aims, all tend to broaden 
and develop character. This is present in a less de- 
gree (and sometimes almost lacking) in the independ- 
ent technical schools, and is an argument in favor 
of taking a college course before entering the profes- 
sional engineering school. But this college life should 
not be the main thing, and should be subordinate to 
the acquisition of sound mental training and disci- 
pline. In this, as in everything, it is a question of 
proper balance; and too many young men in college 
allow the college life and the outside activities, — social, 



128 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIYIL ENGINEERING 

athletic, and others, — to become the main thing, to 
the great detriment of the mental discipline and the 
habits that are more important. 

It is probably the realization of the laxity of the 
usual college course, coupled with the fact that the 
earliest engineering schools were modeled on the second 
plan, by which a college course was not required as a 
preliminary to the engineering course, that has led 
our universities and technical schools to adopt the same 
plan. The standards of work and the earnestness of 
the students are undoubtedly greater in the engineer- 
ing schools than in the colleges. The danger of this 
second plan lies in the fact that the professional school 
naturally tends to make its curriculum consist strictly 
of professional or allied subjects. This has necessarily 
led to a certain narrowness in engineering graduates, 
and a certain habit on their part of devoting themselves 
purely to the technical details of their profession. 
This narrow course of study is, therefore, responsible, 
in the writer's opinion, for the narowness of many en- 
gineers which has been referred to elsewhere in this 
book. Up to within a short time the curricula of most 
of our engineering schools were almost entirely tech- 
nical, though sometimes with a little instruction in 
English, French, German, Economics, or some other 
liberal studies. Of late, there has been a tendency to 
introduce more liberal studies into engineering cur- 
ricula, but their amount is still small in most cases. 

The larger the proportion of time devoted to liberal 
studies, the less remains for technical subjects, so that 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 129 

the student cannot be carried as far into professional 
details as he could if all the time were devoted to them, 
unless the latter are further specialized. Engineering 
schools generally offer a choice between the different 
branches — civil, mechanical, electrical, sanitary, min- 
ing, etc. One of these having been selected, the cur- 
riculum is generally prescribed, with no options except 
in minor matters. But the desire to carry students 
farther in professional subjects, without extending the 
course beyond four years, and also to permit the intro- 
duction of additional liberal studies, has led in some 
cases to further specialization of the courses named; 
for instance, allowing a student in the senior year of 
the civil engineering course to choose between hydraulic 
engineering, railroad engineering, or structural engi- 
neering. The breadth that is supposed to be given by 
the introduction of liberal studies like history, eco- 
nomics, language, etc., is thus counteracted by greater 
narrowness in the professional studies. The writer 
believes that this is a mistake, unless the professional 
specialization is very slight. It is much better to offer 
such professional specialization in post-graduate 
courses. The young man entering an engineering 
school is presumed to have decided upon a career in 
applied science. He has a free choice between the pre- 
scribed courses in the main branches. In most cases he 
finds it difficult enough to decide between civil, mechan- 
ical, or electrical engineering. Moreover, a civil engi- 
neer should have a considerable acquaintance with me- 
chanical and with electrical engineering; otherwise he 



130 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

will be a narrow civil engineer, and his success will be 
much retarded. The converse is also true. It seems to 
the writer a mistake to require or allow him to special- 
ize still farther in civil engineering, itself, in an under- 
graduate course. He should not be encouraged to 
follow the whim of the moment, at the expense of a 
broad knowledge of engineering in general. 

This brings us to the third plan which may be fol- 
lowed, namely, to take first an undergraduate engi- 
neering course, and to follow with a post-graduate 
course in such special professional studies as may be 
desired. Instead of this, some urge that the under- 
graduate course should be extended to cover five or 
even six years, thus permitting the introduction of more 
liberal studies, and also, perhaps, of carrying the pro- 
fessional studies farther than they could be carried 
in a four-year curriculum. This last plan has been 
adopted by Columbia University, where the engineer- 
ing courses require as a preparation, not less than 
three years of college work, with specified training in 
mathematics, physics and chemistry. The engineering 
courses themselves cover three years, so that the entire 
course is six years in length. What seems to the 
writer a serious objection to this plan is that the great 
majority of engineering students are not willing to 
spend more than four years in an undergraduate 
course. Most of them want to get to work, and they 
want some kind of a degree at the end of four years. 
If they are willing to spend six years in study, they 
prefer to take an undergraduate degree in four years, 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEEE 131 

either in college or in an engineering school, and then 
return for two years more in the post-graduate school 
as candidates for a higher degree. The Columbia plan, 
therefore, it appears to the writer, will unduly re- 
strict the number of students in the engineering school, 
and will correspondingly lessen the influence of the 
University in the great field of applied science. 

All friends of education will watch the experiment 
at Columbia with much interest. Undoubtedly New 
York is the most favorable place for such an experi- 
ment, because there are several institutions there, or 
in the neighborhood, which offer the regular four- 
years' course in engineering; and with the great popu- 
lation within a few miles, it is well that there should 
be one institution offering a more extended and elabo- 
rate course. The Columbia course has further the 
great advantage that it is practically a prescribed 
course; not only in the three years in the engineering 
school, but also in the pre-engineering course of three 
years in the college. This college course of three years, 
however, is devoted almost entirely to mathematics, 
chemistry, physics and drawing. Of courses which are 
known as the humanities, this curriculum only includes 
a year and a half in English, a year in French, a year 
in "Modem Civilization" and a year in Economics. 
Counting the course in Modern Civilization as 1^ 
courses, this is only two courses more in the humani- 
ties than are offered in the Harvard Engineering 
School course of four years, and really only one course 
more, in view of the Harvard requirement that all 



132 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIYIL ENGINEERING 

candidates for the degree must have a reading knowl- 
edge of at least one modem language (and no more 
than Harvard if its courses in Accounting, Business 
Administration, and Commercial Law are considered 
humanities). The principal advantage of the Columbia 
course would, therefore, seem to be that it spreads the 
engineering and scientific instruction over a longer 
period, enabling the student to do more thorough work 
and to reflect more on what he learns (if he will), and 
perhaps also going somewhat furth&r in some of the 
technical subjects than the ordinary four-years'^ engi- 
neering course. This ordinary four-years' course, 
however, if the student learns the fundamentals thor- 
oughly, supplemented by one or two years in advanced 
work, and including a course or two in some general 
subject, would seem to give all the advantages that can 
be claimed for the Columbia course. 

The first class graduating at Columbia under the 
new plan was the class of 1918, and the total number 
of students in all courses has shown a falling off from 
489 in 1914-15 to 185 in 1920-21. Columbia gives 
the B.A. degree to students who have taken the college 
preparatory course after they have completed the first 
year of the engineering program, and the engineering 
degree upon completion of the full engineering pro- 
gram. 

A similar plan has been followed since 1893 at the 
Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College, 
where, after three years in college studying certain 
specified. subjects, a student may enter the engineering 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 133 

school, receive the B. A. degree after one year; then, 
after about five months' engineering practice, he may 
return for the second year in the engineering school; 
that is to say, the fifth year of the course, when he 
receives the degree of civil engineer. At this school 
the maximum enrollment was in 1907-08, when there 
were 40 students. In 1920-21 there were 9 students in 
the engineering school and 1,888 students in Dart- 
mouth College. 

Considering these figures, it must, of course, be 
borne in mind that the war has seriously deranged the 
engineering schools, and that they are only just coming 
back to a normal condition. It is also to be remem- 
bered that there is much to be said in favor of a small 
school of engineering, because in such a school the stu- 
dent can receive more individual attention from the 
Professors, and is not turned so much into the hands 
of inexperienced assistants. 

The first plan, by which the engineering school is 
strictly a post-graduate school, requiring a college 
course of four years as preparation, will also, in the 
present state of development, unduly restrict the num- 
ber of students and lessen the influence of the Univer- 
sity in the field of applied science. This plan was first 
tried at Harvard University from 1908-1914. After 
1906 no new undergraduate students were admitted 
to the Lawrence Scientific School, which was the under- 
graduate engineering school of Harvard University up 
to that time, but was then abolished and superseded 
by the graduate school. In 1905-06 the number of 



134 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

students in the Lawrence Scientific School was 504. 
As a graduate school, the engineering school never had 
more than 152 students, which was the number in 
1913-14, when an agreement was made to combine the 
engineering work with that of the Massachusetts Insti- 
tute of Technology. This agreement was declared 
illegal by the Supreme Court, and Harvard University 
then made its engineering school an undergraduate 
school with a course of four years for the Bachelor's 
Degree in Engineering and with advanced courses of 
one or two years for students who desire them, leading 
to advanced degrees. The number of students in 1920- 
21 in this school was 233, and in 1921-22 it is ap- 
parently 258. As a graduate school, the maximum 
number of graduates was 24 in 1914. 

It appears, therefore, as a result of this discussion, 
that the engineering school should offer an under- 
graduate course of four years, with an opportunity 
of selection between the main branches of engineering; 
and also, if its circumstances allow, post-graduate 
courses leading to advanced degrees after one or two 
years. The character of the undergraduate course 
should be carefully considered, and it should not be 
narrow, either by excluding all liberal studies, or by 
specializing in professional subjects. Perhaps the fun- 
damental facts on which it should be based may be 
formulated as follows: 

1. While the intrinsic differences between men must 
be recognized in any scheme of education, engineering 
students have decided that they wish to pursue, and pre- 
sumably are fitted for, applied science. 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 135 

2. Few of them, however, before studying engineering, 
can correctly judge in which branch of engineering their 
main interest or ability lies, or in which fate will cast their 
careers. 

3. None of them can correctly judge what curriculum 
is best fitted to prepare them for an engineering career. 

The curriculum should not be entirely technical, but 
should include at least the opportunity to take some 
liberal studies. In Harvard University, therefore, the 
students are offered the choice between nine curricula, 
each in one of the branches of engineering. In each 
of these the studies are prescribed, except for a few non- 
professional options. The curricula in civil, mechan- 
ical, and electrical engineering are identical up to the 
senior year. If, therefore, a student takes the course 
in civil engineering, and finds himself later called upon 
to engage in mechanical or electrical engineering, he 
will be able to do so, for he will have received instruc- 
tion in the fundamental principles of all. The purely 
technical studies are not carried so far, in the under- 
graduate courses, as in some schools where there is 
more specialization ; but post-graduate courses are of- 
fered, leading to the Master's or Doctor's degree, in 
which they may be pursued to any desired extent. In 
the first two years there are three required or elective 
studies in liberal subjects. The Harvard College course 
requires for the bachelor's degree seventeen full courses 
of a year. At least six of the courses offered in col- 
lege are included as required courses in the engineering 
programs, leaving eleven college courses not specifi- 



136 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

cally offered in the engineering school ; but two of these 
may be taken by the engineering student as the elec- 
tives of the first two years. It may therefore be said 
that at least eight-seventeenths of the engineering pro- 
gram consists of studies optional with college students, 
but required in the engineering curricula, which may, 
therefore, be considered to be about one-half strictly 
technical. By this plan it is believed that the charge 
of narrowness, in any sense, cannot be made; while at 
the same time the fundamentals of engineering are 
taught in the undergraduate course, quite far enough 
to serve as a preparation for practice; and in the 
graduate school a student may go as much farther as 
he likes. 

In its small degree of specialization, this Harvard 
course is believed to differ from any other, and the 
writer thoroughly approves of it. 

Some engineers and educators no doubt believe that 
an engineering course following a college course is 
the ideal plan for those who can afford the time. This 
may be true in certain cases, depending upon the stu- 
dent, the parent, and the college. If the student can 
get the most out of a college course, and avoid the 
temptations to take the easiest way, it may be the best 
for him. There is no reason, however, why such a man 
could not follow the Harvard plan, extending his under- 
graduate engineering course to any desired length, but 
of course he would then receive only one degree. Some 
men are degree chasers, and seem to think that their 
success is made if they can attain the right to aflGix 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 137 

some letters to their names. This, however, does not 
seem a very worthy ambition; it is only what the let- 
ters stand for that makes them of value, and sometimes 
they stand for little — to those who know. "God will 
not look you over for medals, degrees, or diplomas, 
but for scars." 

A young man who decides to follow the first plan 
should arrange his college course with great care, so 
as to facilitate his subsequent professional work as 
much as possible, and avoid gaps between professional 
subjects and the preparatory subjects on which they 
depend. The facility of students to forget what they 
have been taught is one of the wonders of education. 
The writer knows men who after four years in college 
required four more years to complete an undergraduate 
engineering course. They had devoted themselves en- 
tirely to "culture" in college. 

With reference to the temptations to desultory work 
in college, it is a matter of surprise that if the criti- 
cisms of high authorities are valid, nothing is done to 
remedy the situation. The fundamental trouble seems 
to be the great freedom that the student has in the 
choice of studies, combined with laxity of discipline and 
low standards of accomplishment. The elective system 
had its origin in the perception of the fundamental 
truth that men are not equal, and that all should not 
be put through the same mill. To require the same 
program of every man is obviously wrong. But in 
correcting this by the unrestricted, or almost unre- 
stricted, elective system, greater wrongs were intro- 



138 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

duced. It is always so with reforms. There are many 
men who, when they perceive a wrong, think they must 
at once set out to correct it. They see the wrong 
clearly, and they see — or think they see — a way of 
correcting it; but their minds are so fixed on the par- 
ticular wrong that they seek to correct, that they do 
not follow out the consequences of the remedy they 
propose, and so frequently, while correcting one 
wrong, they create a worse. Our legislation is full of 
such instances. Of course this does not mean that 
wrongs should never be corrected, but it does mean 
that a reform should be introduced slowly, only after 
a careful study of the proposed remedy and its con- 
sequences, and by practical men rather than by theo- 
rists and idealists. 

We have seen that Professor Gayley thinks there 
should be no electives in college below the junior year, 
and few afterward. Professor A. G. Keller, of Yale, 
argues very strongly, and to the writer's mind very 
convincingly,* in favor of a required course in college 
covering about three-quarters of the required work, 
leaving one-quarter for electives. The writer has never 
been able to imdestand why the colleges have not imi- 
tated the programs of the technical schools, which have 
been entirely successful, and are admittedly free from 
most of the criticisms that have been directed against 
the college course. While it is not always, or perhaps 
often, possible to tell what career is the correct one for 

* "The B.A. Degree in America," by Professor A. G. Keller, 
Scientific Monthly, February, 1918. 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 139 

a boy entering college, yet it should be possible, if 
parents and teachers would give attention to it, to tell 
what general line of work he is fitted for; whether for 
applied science, for the law, for business, for literature, 
etc. The college might then offer to students a choice 
between a number of courses, one leading to applied 
science, one to pure science, one to the law, one to 
medicine, one to divinity, one to literature, one to busi- 
ness, etc. Each of these courses should offer a pro- 
gram of studies largely prescribed, laid down by those 
who know what course of training is best fitted to equip 
a man for the general line chosen, with a relatively 
small proportion of the time open for the choice of 
electives. This is exactly what the engineering schools 
have been doing, and doing successfully; and it may 
be doubted if there is a college in the country which 
has an engineering school and a college of liberal arts, 
in which the engineering school — if it has been ade- 
quately supported, and encouraged equally with the 
college of liberal arts — ^has not outstripped the latter 
in number of students and in influence; although the 
students in the college of liberal arts, with their cus- 
tomary self-conceit, sometimes look down on the engi- 
neering students as "utilitarians," or as lacking in 
**culture," because they are learning something that 
they can make practical use of. Such a plan as sug- 
gested, if accompanied by discipline — ^which, by the 
way, is always easier to enforce in a technical school 
than in a college, because the results are tangible — and 
by greater discrimination in the selection of teachers, 



140 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

would in the writer's opinion go far to meet the criti- 
cisms so often leveled at the college.* 

There is and has long been a great neglect of natural 
science in our colleges. A young man or woman may 
graduate from almost any one of them with scarcely 
any accurate knowledge of the phenomena of the 
natural world in which we live. On the other hand, 
there is a great exaggeration of the so-called human 
element. Young, immature students crowd into the 
courses in economic and social subjects, and in many 
instances the importance of these subjects is exagge- 
rated by the college authorities. Formerly, it was 
thought that a college president must be a minister. 
That belief, happily, has passed, but even now, if a 
minister is not selected, the president is generally an 
"educator," a psychologist, an economist — rarely a 
scientist, a lawyer, a business man, or an engineer. f 

These economic and social studies are no doubt inter- 
esting and valuable, but the young men who study them 
have no background of experience on which to base 
their conclusions. The subjects themselves are uncer- 
tain. The professor at one college may differ dia- 

* See the books referred to previously. The reader who, like 
the present writer, is inclined to smile at much of the modern 
pedagogical writing, will also derive much amusement from "A 
Joysome History of Education," by Welland Hendrick, published 
by The Point of View, Nyack, N. Y. 

t Probably every reader has heard the epigram: "Those who can, 
do; those who cannot, teach." To which a college professor has 
wittily added the following: "and those who can do neither are 
made college presidents." Happily most cases are exceptions. 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 141 

metrically from the professor at another. There are 
all sorts of opinions, and few of them can be sub- 
mitted to scientific demonstration. The inevitable re- 
sult is that many students, especially those who are 
conceited and lacking in balance, are led to conclude 
that, where doctors disagree, one opinion is as good 
as another, and their own opinion as good as any- 
body's. 

Under the attractive guise of liberality, tolerance, 
broad-mindedness, and looking at all sides of a ques- 
tion, our young men and women are exposed, or expose 
themselves, to the teachings or writings of many who 
are merely unbalanced or crazy fanatics. It is as 
though they should deliberately expose themselves to 
the smallpox, in order to show liberality of mind and 
a desire to see all sides of a question. Nobody should 
expose himself to a contagious disease, trusting to his 
powers of resistance to avoid infection, unless he is 
obliged to do so ; nor should one voluntarily expose 
himself to social disease germs. There are social as 
well as biological germs of disease, which lurk in the 
social body, and which, in a favorable environment, 
will develop and spread with great rapidity and with 
dire results. These social germs of disease are ideas, 
not things. One favorable environment for germs of 
social disease is found in the minds of well-meaning but 
inexperienced and idealistic young men and women. 
These facts form the basis for the charge which is fre- 
quently made, and which is unfortunately truer than 



142 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

it should be, that our men's and women's colleges (not 
engineering schools) are nurseries of socialism.* The 
well-meaning but often idle rich and college-educated 
people, who wish to appear progressive, broad-minded, 
and tolerant, are also open to this charge. A United 
States judge recently publicly said in Boston that the 
spread of socialism and bolshevism was largely due to 
the parlor Bolsheviks and the Harvard Liberal Club. 
It would be much better for our young men and women 
if, instead of studying these economic and social sul>- 
jects so intensively in college, they should take but one 
course in economics which would show them the scope 
and methods of the subject, which should be taught by 
a thoroughly well-balanced man; and if they should 
study mainly science, mathematics, history, logic, and 
the classics, learning to think straight and to know 
the deeds and lives of great men; leaving for a later 
time the further study of economics and social subjects, 
when they would have some practical experience of life 
to guide them. A very distinguished man not long ago 
told the writer that when he graduated from college he 
had a large and varied assortment of economic knowl- 
edge; but about two years' experience in business 
showed him that it was mostly wrong. Abstract 
knowledge is of little value, except in the sciences which 
are themselves purely abstract, namely, mathematics 
and logic. Even these must be used merely as tools 
if they are to be of practical service. In other sub- 

* See an article by Vice-President Calvin Coolidge in The jD«- 
Uneaitor for June, 1921, on "Enemies of the Republic." 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 143 

jects a man cannot learn anything thoroughly unless 
he can relate it to his experience. 

For these reasons the writer has long believed that 
an engineering training is the best preparation for any 
walk of life, and that if a college course is taken it 
should be mainly devoted to science, the classics, his- 
tory, logic and mathematics. 

In the pursuit of ideals it not infrequently happens 
that to remedy Evil A will necessarily produce an 
Evil B ; that to remedy Evil B will produce Evil C ; 
and that to remedy Evil C will produce Evil A. There 
may even be only two horns to the dilemma ; it may be 
that Evil A may be remedied only by producing Evil B, 
and that Evil B may be remedied only by producing 
Evil A. In these cases a choice must be made of what 
will be best on the whole. It is a question of balance. 
Even if an evil exists it does not follow that it should 
be remedied; it may be that it cannot be remedied with-v 
out producing something worse, and that the best bal- 
ance has already been struck. It seems to be so in 
education. Evil A may be non-recognition of the dif- 
ferences in individuals ; this was the. evil in the old pre- 
scribed course, the same for every student. Evil B 
may be the lack of discipline; this is the evil in the 
unrestricted elective system. It is a question of bal- 
ance, and the curriculum which will best balance these 
evils will be the best curriculum. The writer believes 
that the best balance will be by a course almost en- 
tirely prescribed, but allowing the student to choose 
between a number of such courses. 



144 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

It must never be forgotten, however, that more de- 
pends upon how a subject is taught than upon the sub- 
ject itself, and that the greatest discipline may come 
from a subject supposed the least capable of it, if it 
has the right teacher. In Europe, students used to 
move from one university to another, in order to study 
certain subjects with certain leading men. This has 
seldom been done in this country, and cannot well be 
done, except in graduate work, owing to differences in 
the curricula. It might be an improvement if it could 
be done more. 

The education of the engineer is never finished. He 
must be a student all his life, like the physician or 
lawyer. The fundamental bases of mathematics and 
science are of course immutable, but the applications 
change rapidly. The methods of purifying drinking 
water, of treating and disposing of sewage, have been 
revolutionized within comparatively few years. The 
automobile, the aeroplane, the steam turbine, are all 
recent inventions. A new form of road surface has 
come into use within a few years. New properties of 
materials, new methods of treatment, and new mate- 
rials themselves, are being discovered. New experi- 
ments in hydraulics are leading to modifications of old 
methods and formulas. New forms of construction are 
being introduced. Applied science is in a constant state 
of flux. It is most important, therefore, that the engi- 
neering student should learn How to Study. The col- 
lege graduate who cannot by himself pursue farther a 
subject that he has begun, or take up an entirely new 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 145 

subject and master it alone, has largely failed in his 
education. It is not necessary to teach everything in 
college. Yet strangely enough, little attention is given 
to training students how to study. It seems to be 
assumed that because they study, they know how to 
study. It might as well be assumed that because they 
can sing, they know how to sing correctly. The con- 
sequence is that whenever any subject of any human 
interest presents itself, educational theorists think it 
should be taught in the schools. They seem to go on 
the theory that nothing can be learned that is not 
taught in school; and our college and preparatory 
school programs are crowded with subjects that are 
no doubt of interest and importance, but that had bet- 
ter be left for the student to study by himself, confining 
the school work — limited in time as it is — to the teach- 
ing of fundamentals, to giving the student mental disci- 
pline, high aims, mental vision and perspective, mental 
courage, and the power to study by himself.* 

It is not necessary to give here a complete discussion 
of what a curriculum in Civil Engineering should com- 
prise. Nevertheless, for the benefit of any young men 
who may read this book, especially those who may con- 
template taking a college course preparatory to a pro- 
fessional course, a few remarks may be desirable. 

The civil engineer must have a thorough training in 
several branches of natural science. It is sometimes 
said that civil engineering is a three-legged stool rest- 

* See the writer's pamphlet, "How to Study," published by 
McGraw-Hill Book Co.,.191T. 



146 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

ing upon a knowledge of chemistry, physics, and mathe- 
matics. These, indeed, are fundamental, but other 
things, especially mechanics, are equally necessary. 
The civil engineering curriculum should comprise a 
course of at least one year in chemistry, of at least one 
year and preferably two in physics, both chemistry and 
physics including laboratory work, two years of mathe- 
matics extending through the calculus, and at least 
one year in mechanics. A student preparing for civil 
engineering should also acquire a reading knowledge of 
French and German, and it may be to his advantage to 
acquire some knowledge of Italian and Spanish. He 
should have a course of at least one year in history, 
at least one year in English, one year in economics, and 
it will be greatly to his advantage if he can gain some 
knowledge of accounting. As the civil engineer deals 
with topographical features of the earth's surface and 
with stones, cement, and other materials, he should 
have a good knowledge of geology. The work of the 
surveyor, also, requires for some of its operations a 
knowledge of astronomy. All of the above subjects 
can, as a rule, be covered in a college course, and they 
should be covered by the college student who intends to 
take an engineering course later, and who desires to 
economize time in his later professional studies. More- 
over, a knowledge of mechanical drawing is necessary 
for the engineer, which is usually given in the freshman 
year of engineering courses and is necessary for the 
proper understanding of the professional courses 
which follow. The college student should, if possible, 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 147 

either in college or outside, obtain the equivalent of 
such a course in drawing. Descriptive geometry is a 
very important study for the engineer, but it is diffi- 
cult for most students, and with the modern tendency 
towards making everything easy and shunning every- 
thing which is difficult the courses in descriptive geom- 
etry, even in the engineering schools, have in the last 
few decades, in the writer's opinion, been largely weak- 
ened or emasculated. It may be difficult to get a good 
course in this subject in college, but it should be done 
if possible. To this list may be added the subject of 
mechanism and the general subject of power develop- 
ment. Some colleges offer opportunity for courses in 
these subjects which should be embraced by students 
contemplating a career in any branch of engineering. 

If the college student can cover in his four years* 
course in college the subjects above enumerated, he 
will still have time to include a goodly number of other 
courses from among those offered by the college, which 
will round out his general education and at the same 
time help him in his profession, and upon the comple- 
tion of such a course he will as a rule be able to obtain 
an undergraduate engineering degree in two years in 
an engineering school. 

The curriculum of the technical engineering studies 
need not be described in detail. The curricula of the 
different engineering schools are very much alike — on 
paper. They may differ greatly, however, in thorough- 
ness, in the manner in which the courses are given, and 
in the attention which can be given to the individual 



148 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

student, the latter depending upon the size of classes 
and the number of instructors. The technical subjects 
in a civil engineering course should cover those outlined 
in Chapter III of this book, beginning with surveying, 
which is now frequently given as a continuous course 
for about two months during the summer. The college 
student will do well, and will save some time, if he will 
take such a course while in college, and he can easily 
arrange to do so by attending during a summer one 
of the engineering summer schools, provided he has the 
proper preparation in mathematics and drawing. 

Following surveying, the engineering curriculum in- 
cludes a study of railroads in the different branches, 
of highway engineering, a comprehensive course in hy- 
draulics, courses in the different branches of hydraulic 
engineering, and a course in structural engineering 
extending as a rule through two years ; these courses 
being combined with laboratory work to a sufficient 
extent to enable the student to appreciate the theoreti- 
cal and technical principles which he is taught in the 
class room. 

The sanitary engineer should follow his study of 
chemistry with a study of bacteriology, biology, the 
chemistry of waters, and the chemical principles gov- 
erning the purification of water and the disposal of 
sewage. He should also have instruction in public 
hygiene and in physiology. 

Whether it is best for a young man contemplating 
the career of a civil engineer to take a college course 
first or to enter the engineering school at once will 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 149 

depend largely upon the individual and upon the col- 
lege. The atmosphere and the incentives to work vary 
in different colleges, and of course individuals differ 
greatly, as well as the influences that they are under 
at home. The writer believes that most college students 
are desirous of doing hard work, and regret the dis- 
tractions and the laxity which prevail so often in col- 
lege. Some of them would like to be rescued from these 
distractions and encouraged to do more serious work, 
but the atmosphere of the college and perhaps the 
influence of their teachers is in some cases against it. 
If a large number of students in a college come from 
families of small or moderate means, and especially if 
many of these students are paying their own way, they 
will be apt to be more earnest and more desirous of 
doing hard work than if they come from wealthy fami- 
lies, whose sons are too often sent to college for social 
reasons, to have a good time, and to belong to a high- 
class social club. The writer believes that if one of 
our colleges should successfully remove the charges so 
often brought against the college course, whether in 
the way suggested in this chapter or in some better 
way, it would meet with immediate and great success, 
and with approval on the part of the students them- 
selves, or at least of the better class of students ; and 
to the young man who contemplates taking a college 
course before entering the engineering school, he would 
offer the advice to choose his college with the greatest 
discrimination. 

To the great majority of young men who wish to 



150 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

follow a career in engineering, my advice would be 
this: Enter an engineering school as soon as you are 
prepared, and get the habit of work at once : — and not 
only the habit of work, but train yourself to work 
effectmely. Hard work will not help you much if it is 
ineffective and does not lead to results. Perseverance 
is not a virtue if misdirected toward unworthy aims, 
or toward impossible aims, no matter how good in 
the abstract. 

Broaden yourself as much as possible. Acquaint 
yourself with the great men who have gone before ; 
learn what they did and said and thought, and relate 
all this to your own experience and aims. Read the 
classics in the best translations you can find. Learn 
to use the English language well and to speak in public 
without embarrassment. Extend your technical educa- 
tion over more than four years if you can do so profit- 
ably, but not too long, for too much school education 
is as bad as too little, and probably worse. Your real 
education will come later anyway. 

To young men who enter college with no definite aim, 
my advice would be: No matter what career you may 
decide to follow, study the sciences upon which engi- 
neering is based, and as much of engineering as you can 
consistently get in your college course. These things 
will be useful to you in any career — more useful than 
many so-called cultural subjects. Select courses that 
will call forth your most serious effort, not those that 
are easy for you. Do not aim for culture, whatever 
you may understand that to mean, but for training. 



EDUCATION OF THE ENGINEER 151 

Acquaint yourself with the principal fields of human 
thought, and learn thoroughly the fundamental prin- 
ciples of those you select. Do not go too deeply into 
any one, but study the fundamentals thoroughly. You 
cannot become a specialist or an expert in four years. 
If you try to become an expert in college you will more 
likely turn out a sham or a narrow bigot. If you aim 
for culture, you will be likely to turn out a conceited 
ass ; if you aim for wisdom, you will be likely to turn 
out a pedant. If you work hard, take advantage of 
your opportunities, follow good advice, culture and 
wisdom will come of themselves in due time, if they 
are meant for you. Select as your guides men who are 
broad-minded and tolerant of differing opinions in con- 
troversial subjects, rather than those who are dog- 
matic and mentally arrogant. Give little time to con- 
troversial subjects in which your teacher may hold 
views very different from those held by equally good 
authorities elsewhere, and in which your own view — 
whether based on prejudice or not — cannot be proved 
either right or wrong; but rather study subjects in 
which, while there is room for independent thought, 
if you are wrong you can be shown to be wrong, and 
the reasons stated. Train your mind to be a reliable 
logical instrument, which you can turn upon any sub- 
ject and be sure of reasoning correctly, leaving contro- 
versial subjects for later study, when you will have 
experience to give you the data. Learn to have respect 
for those who have not had the opportunity for a col- 
lege education, and realize that many such men are 



152 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

making more of themselves than you will ever make of 
yourself. Above all, learn intellectual modesty even 
while sure of your ground, and remember that when you 
graduate your education will have been only begun. 



CHAPTER V 

CHARACTERISTICS OF CIVIL ENGINEERING 
AS A PROFESSION 

Every profession or occupation has features which 
might be termed unfavorable, and others which might 
be termed favorable; yet what one person might con- 
sider favorable, another might think unfavorable. It 
is a question of personal adaptation. If a young man 
is distinctly adapted for a certain profession, it may 
have no disadvantages for him. But few young men 
are distinctly fitted for but one occupation. Most 
men would succeed equally well in any one of a number, 
if their training and discipline were directed toward 
the one chosen. Every occupation has characteristics, 
and, therefore, instead of having one chapter on the 
advantages of Civil Engineering as a profession, and 
another on its disadvantages, the present chapter will 
discuss the Characteristics of Civil Engineering as a 
Profession. Each reader may then decide which are 
to him advantages and which disadvantages. 

First among the attractions of Civil Engineering 
may be placed the opportunity that 'it offers of doing 
constructive and enduring work. If, as has been 
claimed in this book, engineering in its broadest sense 
is the main element in advancing civilization, it is ob- 

153 



154 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

vious that the engineer who builds a railroad, furnishes 
a city with water, develops by irrigation a tract of land 
previously useless, constructs a port or a canal for 
handling the commerce of the world, or completes or 
aids in completing any other large and useful engi- 
neering work, is a direct agent in doing good to his 
fellow-men. The engineer can look upon his completed 
work with pride and satisfaction, and can see before his 
eyes the fruits of his labor. His work is a permanent 
monument to his skill and diligence; it does not dis- 
appear as soon as it is done and paid for. 

It is, of course, too often true that the credit for the 
engineer's work is given to others ; but this is not con- 
fined to engineering. Ask who built any of our trans- 
continental railway lines, and the reply will probably 
give the name of some financier or promoter who car- 
ried the project to completion, and not that of the 
engineer who designed or superintended the work. That, 
however, is merely an illustration of the fact that 
justice is not always done in this world. And often, 
too, the real credit may be due to the promoter, who 
had the vision, the command of capital, the energy, 
and the perseverance to push the project. But these 
faculties are not beyond the command of the trained 
engineer, who should not confine himself to mere tech- 
nical details, but should cultivate other qualities if he 
would make the most of himself. And it is certainly 
true that the financier who endeavors to carry out en- 
gineering undertakings without the advice and judg- 
ment of a trained engineer to guide him, is apt to make 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 155 

costly failures rather than successes, as the history of 
such projects clearly shows. 

The second attraction of engineering is that it tends 
to train and develop character. The true engineer is 
a scientific man, and should be imbued with the true 
scientific spirit. He deals with the applications of the 
immutable laws of nature. He cannot violate those 
laws without the inevitable penalty being visited on 
somebody. His work develops the habit of seeking only 
the truth. He is not concerned to make the worse 
appear the better reason. The engineer, as a rule, 
does not deal in bluff; he has nothing to "put over;'* 
though there are no doubt bluffers and charlatans in 
the profession. 

Engineering is impersonal, dealing, as it does, with 
the laws of nature. Of the four learned professions, 
law, medicine, theology, and applied science or engi- 
neering, it has been remarked that all except the last 
are mainly concerned with the sorrows, sufferings, and 
quarrels of mankind. This may be considered, from 
one point of view, an advantage of the first three: for 
surely it is a privilege to be able to relieve suffering, 
to alleviate sorrow, and to compose fairly the quarrels 
of mankind. But the habitual contact with and con- 
templation of suffering, sorrow, and contention, while 
it may develop feelings of gentleness, kindness, sym- 
pathy, or justice, may sometimes lead to a certain cal- 
lousness and indifference, and even to hardness, cold- 
ness, and lack of sympathy. However this may be, engi- 
neering is impersonal. But the laws of nature can only 



X 



156 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

be applied through human agency, and the engineer 
must study men and learn to deal with and direct their 
efforts, without being concerned professionally in their 
sorrows, sufferings, or quarrels. 

Speaking to a group of young consular appointees 
the other day Secretary Hughes said : "I confess that in 
my experience with young men the capacity I have 
found least often is the capacity for accuracy." Engi- 
neering trains the habit of accuracy. The engineer 
deals with measurable quantities, and his conclusions 
are often or generally based upon careful calculations, 
comparisons, and studies. The applications of science 
are superior to pure mathematics in this respect, be- 
cause, while mathematics is accurate, its results depend 
entirely upon the data introduced into the problem. 
With these the pure mathematician has nothing to do ; 
he deals with a machine which takes those data and 
produces a result. But the engineer is first of all, and 
often mainly, concerned with the data; and having 
decided upon them he uses the mathematical machine 
with a conscious realization of the relation between data 
and result. Mathematics is but one of the tools he 
uses; the others are judgment, experience, observation, 
knowledge of the properties of materials, and so on. 

Engineering also trains habits of logical thought, 
though perhaps the law may be superior and other 
vocations equal in this respect. Engineering has the 
advantage over many other subjects that, while it 
offers ample opportunity for the use of judgment, and 
while many things in it may be largely matters of 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 157 

opinion, it deals mainly with matters in which some 
degree of demonstration is possible. To deal entirely 
with matters that are certain, as we do in mathematics 
(the data being assumed) does not necessarily develop 
the power of logical thinking, but more often merely 
the skillful use of the machine. Neither does the study 
of subjects which are much involved in doubt, in which 
authorities differ widely, and in which experiment and 
demonstration are difficult or impossible. Such are 
certain parts of economic theory, and such, largely, 
is history. Facts may be difficult or impossible of 
attainment in these subjects; and experiment, in the 
scientific sense, in which one element only is varied, 
is impossible. You cannot experiment scientifically in 
economics or history. You may put on a high tarijff ; 
but the sequence of events will not prove the eff'ect of 
that tariff", because other elements are never the same. 
But the engineer who wishes to study the eff'ect of 
carbon on the tensile strength of steel has only to pre- 
pare a series of samples alike in everything except the 
carbon content, and the resulting diff^erences in tensile 
strength will be necessarily due to the carbon. It is 
true that it may be difficult to get the samples identical 
in all other respects ; and it is also true that very 
slight differences in another element, such as nickel, 
may produce large differences in the results obtained. 
Before the discovery of the relations between bacillas 
and disease, two samples of water might have been 
as nearly identical as the minutest chemical analysis 
could disclose, and yet one might have been the cause 



158 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

of typhoid fever, and the other not. In this case a 
microscopic organism, before undiscovered, made all 
the difference in the world. But these instances only 
illustrate the difficulty of attaining absolute certainty, 
and do not at all invalidate the conclusion that the 
power of logical thinking is best developed by the study 
of subjects, like engineering, in which crucial experi- 
ments are possible, in which reasonable certainty may 
be attained, and yet in which there is enough oppor- 
tunity for the use of judgment and for differences of 
opinion to encourage the use of the imagination and the 
use of hypothesis and verification. 

By its combination of the practical and the scientific, 
of business, administration, and the direction of men, 
engineering may serve to develop a breadth of view 
which is of great benefit. Many engineers, however, 
devote themselves so closely to technical details that 
they lose this advantage ; but that is the fault -of the 
individual, and not of the profession as such. 

For reasons already referred to, the practice of 
engineering develops, or tends to develop, mental cour- 
age, resource and decision. No two engineering prob- 
lems are exactly alike. Conditions differ, and contin- 
gencies arise which call for not only technical knowl- 
edge, but for quick decision, fertility of resource, initia- 
tive, and courage. Not infrequently something has to 
be done that was never done before by that engineer, or, 
so far as he knows, by any engineer. These are valu- 
able qualities in any walk of life. 

Engineering also develops a sense of responsibility, 



CIYIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 159 

perhaps to a greater degree than most occupations. 
The writer recalls hearing the late Joseph H. Choate 
wittily refer to the difference in this respect between 
engineering, medicine, and the law, somewhat as follows : 
If a doctor loses his patient, it is never his fault. He 
can always ascribe it to disobedience of his orders or 
to the incurability of the case. He goes on — ^he lives 
on — and acquires new patients and new fame. If the 
lawyer loses his case, it is never his fault. He can al- 
ways ascribe it to the prejudice of the jury, the per- 
verseness of witnesses, or the unfairness of the judge. 
He goes on, and acquires new clients and new fame. 
But if the engineer '^s structure* collapses, he had better 
be under it. He is held 'responsible, and his reputation 
may be ruined. This has not infrequently been illus- 
trated. The collapse of the Ashtabula bridge, in Ohio, 
in 1876, led to the loss of some reputations and to 
one suicide. The collapse of the first Quebec bridge 
caused the loss of some reputations, including that of 
the principal engineer, who had been considered the 
leading bridge engineer in this country. He had ex- 
pected that this structure would be his greatest work, 
and the fitting culmination of his creditable career ; but 
instead it filled his closing years with sorrow. All this 
may be considered an objection to the profession of en- 
gineering, rather than an advantage. And yet a man 
who shirks responsibility lacks courage, and to cultivate 
a sense of responsibility goes far to make a strong man. 
Every act has its result. An unwise or ignorant or 
careless act may bring disaster, whether in engineering, 



160 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

finance, or administration. One great difficulty of our 
present social system is that the results of unwise acts 
of one man are visited on innocent people who have not 
deserved the penalty. If all penalties could be visited 
upon those who have incurred or deserved them, it 
would be a great improvement, but it is impossible. 

One of the greatest attractions of an engineering 
training is the advantages that it gives, and the oppor- 
tunities that it affords, in the various lines of business. 
We live in an age of engineering, of power, of applied 
science. Not a day passes that does not bring a man in 
contact with some phase of applied science. Wars are 
decided now by engineers, not by knights in single 
combat. Every industry depends upon the engineer. 
Therefore, a training in applied science, if not narrow, 
but combined with training in language, history, eco- 
nomics, and other things essential to the cultivated 
man, cannot fail to be of great value. The execu- 
tives of many of our great corporations began as en- 
gineers. Indeed, the writer has had in his classes men 
who have afterward been led into very different occu- 
pations ; men who have become lawyers, doctors, artists, 
and even clergymen ; and he has never met one who has 
not expressed himself as greatly indebted to his engi- 
neering training. All have said that they would not 
willingly relinquish what it did for them. Of course, 
in regard to ultimate success, all depends upon the in- 
dividual. A man who wills to succeed cannot be kept 
under. But there is no question in the writer's mind 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 161 

that a proper engineering training is one of the surest 
roads leading to a successful and useful life. 

Coming to more material considerations, an engineer- 
ing career is a healthful one. Some engineering work 
is confining, and does not require out-door exercise; 
but most engineering work, particularly in civil en- 
gineering, requires a good deal of out-door work. 
Sometimes, indeed, it requires more than is pleasant, 
and calls for exposure, risk, and danger in severe 
weather. Generally speaking, however, it may be said 
with truth that civil engineering is a healthful and phy- 
sically stimulating occupation. 

Much of what has been said applies to other branches 
of engineering, and not alone to civil engineering; but 
no distinction between the different branches of the 
profession has been deemed necessary or desirable. 

Engineers, and more particularly their wives, often 
complain that their work takes them about the country 
so much that they are unable to settle down and have 
a home in one place. A civil engineer may be engaged 
for some years on a piece of work in Massachusetts, 
but his next job may be in the far west, or even in a 
foreign country. This may be true whether he is work- 
ing for himself or for an employer or corporation. 
Even if a civil engineer has a fixed position on a rail- 
road, his work may be liable at any moment, as in an 
emergency, to call him away for days or weeks to dis- 
tant parts of the company's system, if it is a large one. 
He cannot count, as most business men can, upon 
spending every night at home with his family; and he 



162 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

may be obliged, at short notice, to change his place of 
residence. 

While the above criticism undoubtedly has force, yet 
it may be questioned whether the civil engineer neces- 
sarily has to lead a more nomadic life than most men 
in other occupations. A salesman for a commercial 
house may have to be on the road, away from home, 
practically all the time; and even a high officer in a 
business concern often finds it necessary to change 
his place of residence, if the business of the concern is 
not concentrated in one place. A minister often has 
to move. Methodist ministers used to do so every year. 
The officer of the army or navy is notoriously nomadic 
and never knows to what post he may be ordered. Rail- 
road officers frequently go from one road to another, 
and move their places of residence. The business of 
a lawyer, also, often requires extended absences from 
home, if not a change of domicile. The engineer, too, 
may, if he wishes to practice in one place, open an office 
there, like a doctor or lawyer, and go away as little 
as he may choose. 

Generally speaking, however, it may be admitted that 
the business of engineering is so spread out over the 
earth's surface, and work in one locality is so often 
done by or under the direction of engineers whose 
principal place of business is in an entirely diff'erent 
locality, that the civil engineer is less able to establish 
a home in one place and count upon occupying it per- 
manently and continuously, than men in most other 
occupations. By some this will be considered an ob- 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 163 

jection, by others an advantage. If a man is very 
domestic in his tastes, has little love for travel or 
adventure, and is unhappy unless he can spend his eve- 
nings regularly by his own fireside and in the same 
house, he would probably not select the career of an 
active civil engineer. Some, however, will consider the 
necessity of more or less change of location as an 
advantage. Certainly it makes a man acquainted with 
different parts of the country, enlarges his acquaint- 
ance, teaches him that there are fine people anywhere, 
acquaints him with different points of view, and so 
necessarily broadens him, makofs him tolerant, and 
prevents him from falling into a narrow rut and be- 
coming prejudiced and provincial. 

Moreover, if an engineer desires, he may attach him- 
self to some branch of the profession, or to some con- 
cern, where there wiU be the minimum chance of moving 
about. Many civil engineers have lived their whole lives 
in one place. Nevertheless, as already stated, the like- 
lihood of a change of location, and the necessity of 
absence from home for periods more or less long, are 
probabilities or possibilities that the prospective engi- 
neer must face. 

Another objection sometimes urged against civil en- 
gineering is the fact that the work of the engineer is 
often done out of doors, under severe conditions of 
weather and exposure, and sometimes at considerable 
risk of accident. It is true that works of construction 
must be done out of doors, and that some engineering 
work, like railroad location and construction, hydraulic 



164 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

works of some kinds, especially if in remote or inacces- 
sible regions, tunnel work, some kinds of foundation 
work, coast works, and other works, may involve the 
necessity of severe exposure, and some risk of injury or 
accident, or even of life. This is not true, however, of 
all kinds of civil engineering-work. Some kinds require 
work in the office only, and give too little out-door ex- 
ercise. The young engineer, while gaining his exper- 
ience and making a place and reputation for himself, 
should expect and desire to do location and construc- 
tion work in the field, for in that way he will best gain 
the practical knowledge of materials, their handling 
and use, and the control of men, which will be necessary 
for his success in higher positions. To gain this neces- 
sary experience should not require many years, and 
afterwards he may be able to avoid serious exposure 
or risk if he desires. In this case, however, as in the 
case previously discussed, there are advantages. Ex- 
posure and hardshi;^, and even strenuous work out 
of doors, develops stamina, courage, and health, and 
will not be shunned by the strong, ambitious man who is 
otherwise fitted for an engineering career. It may, 
however, perhaps fairly be said that civil engineering 
in general is not a favorable occupation for a young 
man who is physically weak. Perhaps this would be 
better expressed by saying that such a man, if other- 
wise fitted for the profession, should direct himself 
along professional lines that will not require severe 
physical exertion; and this can easily be done. Such 
a man, for example, should aim to secure work, not in 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 165 

connection with new construction, but in conection with 
the management of completed enterprises. As already 
stated, much of the highest kind of civil engineering 
work, as, for instance, structural designing, calls for 
little or no out-door exposure, and scarcely any risk 
of physical injury. 

Another objection sometimes urged against civil en- 
gineering is that the demand for engineers is very 
variable, being very great in times of prosperity, when 
much construction is being done, while in times of 
business depression many engineers are unemployed. 
This is true, but it is not confined to engineering, 
though that profession is perhaps more subject to 
variation in demand than some others. Medicine is 
probably the most naturally stable of the professions ; 
that is, the least subject to fluctuations due to business 
depression or prosperity. People will always be sub- 
ject to sickness, and perhaps when business men are 
worried by hard times there is more likelihood of sick- 
ness than in times of prosperity, when everybody is 
optimistic. Ministers, too, do not lose their positions 
in times of depression, for at such times people most 
need encouragement, faith, and hope. And probably 
thera is as much quarreling, and as many law suits, at 
one time as at another, though with less business there 
will generally be less legal business to be done. There 
is, therefore, little doubt that civil engineering is open in 
some degree to the objection just referred to. 

Re-ference has been made to the fact that civil en- 
gineering does not, as a rule, deal with sentiment. It 



166 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIYIL ENGINEERING 

is concerned with cold facts, while with the doctor and 
lawyer, sentiment enters largely into the feelings of 
their clients. For this reason, the doctor and lawyer 
can charge larger fees than the engineer, even though 
their services may be of less real value. When a man 
thinks he is going to die, he may be very glad to pay his 
physician or surgeon a large fee if he can be made to 
believe that this practitioner has saved his life. In 
reality, the medicine given him may have been bread 
pills, or the operation may have been unnecessary. It 
is a matter of sentiment. So if a man is sued for a 
large sum, gets frightened nearly to death, and his law- 
yer gets him out of his scrape, he may be delighted to 
pay the lawyer a good part of what he stood to lose 
or thought he stood to lose. 

There are of course many noble physicians who 
obtain their main satisfaction from the consciousness 
that they are relieving human suffering and bringing 
comfort and cure to the afflicted, with little thought of 
their own personal profit — or with no more than a 
due regard for such profit ; I say with no more than a 
due regard for such profit, because a due regard for 
one's personal interest in any walk of life, if combined 
with the strictest regard for the rights of others, is a 
fundamental moral duty. 

"Self love, my liege, is not so vile a sin 
As self -neglecting." 

We all know such physicians. The "grateful patient" 
is a pleasant and cheering accompaniment of medical 
practice of the highest kind. 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 167 

There are also many lawyers who practice their pro- 
fession in a similar spirit and strive to compose quar- 
rels rather than to prolong them. Nevertheless, there 
are physicians and lawyers who are quick to take ad- 
vantage of the opportunity of making use of sentiment 
in fixing their charges, and some have used it in a way 
contrary to what seems to the writer sound economic 
principles. Some physicians delude themselves into 
thinking that they are charitable because they treat 
poor people free ; but charity implies self-denial, and if 
a doctor who treats poor people free makes up for it 
by charging higher prices to his wealthy patients, he is 
not practicing charity at all, but is a socialist and is 
merely making his wealthy patients pay the bills of 
poor patients by hiring him to treat them for nothing. 
Some surgeons have the practice of charging for an 
operation a certain percentage of the income of the 
patient, and they criticize severely such a principle as 
that laid down recently by the Johns Hopkins Univer- 
sity, by which the maximum charge for an operation is 
fixed. But it is obvious that if a very wealthy man is 
forced to pay five per cent, of his income for a simple 
operation, while a man with little or no income pays 
nothing, the doctor is not benevolent, but is simply 
forcing the rich man to pay the bills of the poor man, 
without any regard to the question whether the poor 
man*s poverty has been the result of extravagance, in- 
temperance, or lack of thrift. Such a practice penal- 
izes thrift and saving, and encourages the opposite 
qualities. There is no more reason why the rich man 



168 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

should be forced to pay the doctor's bills for a poor 
man than there is for forcing him to pay the poor man's 
grocery or clothing bills. And doctors who practise 
this method should logically expect that their chauf- 
feurs and domestic servants, the engineer or architect 
who builds a house for them, or all who render them 
service, should charge them on the same principle. The 
poor who have communicable diseases should, of course, 
for the protection of the health of the community, be 
treated free, or isolated, if they cannot or will not 
provide treatment for themselves. But it is a serious 
question how far free medical treatment should be car- 
ried, and undoubtedly there is much hypocrisy in con- 
nection with it. It is all right for the rich to give to 
the poor if they wish to do so, but it is all wrong for 
an individual or for the State to force a rich man to 
give to the poor, directly or indirectly, against his will. 
When done by the State it is socialism, pure and sim- 
ple; when done by an individual it is just as bad. Some 
lawyers, also, are extortionate in their charges because 
they can take advantage of sentiment in making them. 

This may all be summarized by saying that there is 
much more opportunity for the quack and fakir and 
charlatan in the medical and legal professions than 
in the engineering profession. This, however, will 
hardly be considered a disadvantage of the engineering 
profession except by a man who wishes to be himself 
a quack or a fakir. 

While it is probably true that the engineer, for rea- 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 169 

sons which have been explained, cannot to the same ex- 
tent take advantage of sentiment in making his charges, 
yet the talk which is sometimes heard among engineers 
about the disadvantage of the engineer as compared 
with the lawyer or the physician arises from envy, 
generated by occasionally hearing of lawyers or doc- 
tors who receive very large fees for services requiring 
but little time. It is the same feeling which leads the 
union agitator to declaim against capital and the large 
salaries paid to captains of industry. It does not 
mean that the engineer has any lower standing, or that 
his services are any less valuable, measured by a proper 
standard. 

The point is, that the services of the physician or 
the lawyer are more often personal services than those 
of the engineer. The engineer, in general, works for 
the public or the community rather than for the in- 
dividual. Now, the individual is always more responsive 
and appreciative than the public. An aristocracy or 
a small body of men, such as the directors of a corpora- 
tion, may appreciate services done them or to those 
they represent, but this will not, in general, be true 
of a democracy. This is one reason why Public Service 
in this country is not more attractive to able men. 
Too often their services, though great, may be unap- 
preciated, and they may be rewarded only by criticism 
and contumely. Nevertheless, while the "grateful pa- 
tient'* does not exist for the engineer, it is perhaps 
even a greater satisfaction for him to feel that he is 



170 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

constructing works which add to the convenience and 
comfort, or even furnish the necessities, for thousands 
and millions of his fellow men every day. 

As a matter of fact, while it is true that the engineer 
does not generally receive fees as large as those often 
paid in law or surgery, it is probable that the aver- 
age earning is as large in civil engineering as in the 
law or medicine. This statement cannot be proved 
or disproved, as the writer knows of no available 
statistics. The lawyer who defends or prosecutes a 
suit involving millions, or who breaks or sustains a 
will involving a large estate, may receive an enormous 
fee, much larger than that ever gained by an engineer, 
but the average earnings of lawyers are probably 
moderate. An engineer who puts through a large en- 
terprise generally does so as an employee, on a salary, 
and if a large profit is made, it is apt to go to the pro- 
moter or financier who employs the engineer. But en- 
gineering fees are often large, and the willingness to 
pay such fees is increasing. The writer knows of one 
fee of $125,000 paid to an engineer, and this is large 
enough to satisfy most people.* 

Some engineers complain that their profession has 
not the standing of the law and medicine in the public 
estimation, and that the engineer is not as highly re- 
spected or influential as the lawyer. This is certainly 
untrue, as a general statement. It is a question of the 
individual. The writer is sure that leading engineers 

* See Judge Baldwin's interesting work in this series, on "The 
Young Man and the Law," pp. 44-53, in which he says that law- 
yer's fees are generally overestimated. 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 171 

have quite as high a standing as any other members of 
the community. There are, of course, engineers of 
low standing and low merit ; but there are many more 
lawyers and doctors who are considered beneath con- 
tempt. And as to earnings, that should be an entirely 
subordinate question in any intelligent consideration 
of the matter of choosing a profession. The main ques- 
tion is as to the opportunities it offers for service, and 
for the performance of valuable and enduring work, 
and in these respects engineering is unexcelled by any 
other field. Let the young man who wishes to become 
an engineer fully prepare himself for the work, and 
to meet life's problems, and he need not worry as to 
whether he will be recognized as he deserves, or as to 
whether he will be able to support himself. Let the 
reader reflect on the words of Emerson, quoted as a 
motto at the beginning of this book. 

Nevertheless, it is true that the engineer often does 
find that his services seem less appreciated than they 
ought to be, and there are reasons for this, as there 
are for everything. 

One of these reasons is that the engineer is often a 
narrow man, occupied mainly with the technical details 
of his profession. He is often not a good mixer, and 
not apt to be so interested in general aff^airs, or so con- 
versant with literature, history, art, or music, as men 
in other walks of life. This is unfortunately a common 
characteristic of the engineer, but it is his own fault, 
and partly that of his training, as has been referred to 
in Chapter IV. There is no necessity for it. 



172 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIYIL ENGINEERING 

If the engineer concerns himself with technical de- 
tails entirely, does not mix in society, take part in 
public affairs, belong to social clubs, or take part in 
social activities, it is very natural that such a man 
should come to be regarded as a high-class workman 
rather than as a highly trained professional man, but 
this is a question of the individual. 

It is also a fact that engineers are often lacking in 
the power of expression. They often lack the ability to 
speak easily, forcibly, or correctly in public, and fre- 
quently they lack the power to express themselves in 
writing. This again diminishes the regard in which 
such a man will be held in popular estimation, but there 
is no necessity for it. The fact that such conditions 
exist and that the engineer is often handicapped, shows 
the necessity of a broader education than the engineer 
usually receives, and the necessity for self-cultivation 
in these matters throughout life. This condition of 
things cannot fairly be considered a disadvantage of 
the profession. It is probably true, however, that the 
practice of engineering, dealing as it does with technical 
details largely, and less with affairs of the day and 
matters of business than the profession of law, should 
tend to cultivate in the engineer this lack of breadth. 

The engineer is generally a modest man, frequently 
too modest. He does not assert himself enough. The 
study of science, the possession of the scientific attitude 
of mind, the realization of the uncertainties involved 
in most problems, all tend to cultivate this trait. On 
the other hand, men who study uncertain subjects like 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 173 

many branches of economics are often the most dog- 
matic and intellectually arrogant, and such men, 
though they may be charlatans or bluffers, sometimes 
make their way for a time and succeed in deceiving peo- 
ple into believing that they are reliable guides. 

The engineer is frequently a poor salesman, es- 
pecially of his own services. This is largely due to his 
modesty, combined with a frequent lack of business 
capacity. This again, however, is no fault of the pro- 
fession. The doctor and the lawyer seem to have no 
difficulty in learning how to charge for their services. 
The engineer should learn the same lesson. 

It will be seen from the above that most of the dis- 
advantages that have been claimed to exist with ref- 
erence to civil engineering are disadvantages of the in- 
dividual, rather than disadvantages of the profession. 
It has no doubt been true in the past that, taking a 
college class, a larger proportion of the best and 
strongest men have gone into law rather than into 
engineering. It is also still true that it is impossible 
to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear. If weak men 
go into the practice of engineering they cannot expect 
to make any greater success in it than in any other 
profession. If, however, strong men go into it, men 
possessing breadth, justifiable self-confidence, a 
thorough knowledge of principles, character, persever- 
ance, determination, tact, initiative — men who are de- 
termined to succeed, and who have business capacity as 
well as technical knowledge, they will find ample op- 
portunities in the profession, or in the business fields 



174 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

in which a knowledge of civil engineering is perhaps 
the best preparation for success, or at least as good a 
preparation as any. The engineer is becoming more 
and more appreciated. He is being called in as an ad- 
viser in economic matters, as a witness in cases before 
the courts, as a member of public commissions, as an 
arbitrator, and the popular estimation in which he is 
held is increasing steadily. There is no reason why 
the highest offices and the greatest distinction should 
not be within his reach if he will not insist on staying 
within his shell. He is being daily more and more rec- 
ognized as the kind of man competent to form a clear, 
unbiased and independent judgment on important busi- 
ness matters. Probably the engineer is better appre- 
ciated in Europe than he is in this country, though it 
is difficult to see why this should be the case. In Eng- 
land it is common to pay large fees for engineering 
services — as a rule, larger than those that are paid in 
this country. 

Reference has been made to the fact that many 
high executives in our great corporations and in the 
railroad and business world have begun as civil en- 
gineers. This is becoming more and more true in the 
political world, although here the profession of law 
still seems to lead most frequently to eminence. George 
Washington was a surveyor, as was Abraham Lincoln 
also for a time. President Sadi Carnot, the fourth 
President of the French Republic, was a civil engineer, 
trained in the State Engineering School. President 
Menocal of Cuba was a civil engineer, a graduate of 



CIVIL ENGINEERING AS A PROFESSION 175 

one of our own engineering schools. We all know that 
Mr. Hoover, Secretary of Commerce in President 
Harding's Cabinet, is a mining engineer. The writer 
knows of several instances where engineers have been 
elected mayors of cities, and they have frequently been 
members of important public commissions having to do 
with administrative as well as construction work. City 
managers, under the plan now so largely in vogue, are 
generally engineers. The present Governor of Ver- 
mont is a mechanical engineer and past President of 
the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Never- 
theless, it must not be concluded that if a man wants 
to be mayor, governor, or president, the easiest way is 
through engineering. 

In England, too, great respect is paid to the memory 
of eminent engineers. Robert Stephenson and Thomas 
Telford are buried side by side in Westminster Abbey 
and Lord Kelvin is also buried there. There are also 
memorial windows to Joseph Locke, Isambard Brunei, 
Richard Trevithick, Sir Benjamin Baker, Sir William 
Siemens and Lord Kelvin; and one to the memory of 
Sir John Wolfe Barry will be placed there shortly. 
These instances merely show that if the engineer desires 
to enter public life there is no real obstacle in the way. 
The work of administering the affairs of a large city 
involves engineering matters at almost every turn. It 
also involves legal and business matters, but these latter 
are no more important, and probably less important, 
than the engineering matters. There is no reason why 
the engineer should not acquire a sufficient knowledge 



176 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

of legal procedure and of business affairs, and it is 
probably easier for him to do this than it is for the law- 
yer or the business man to acquire a knowledge of engi- 
neering matters. Of course, a lawyer as mayor of a city 
may say that he can hire engineering advice, but it is 
equally true that an engineer as the mayor of a city 
could hire legal advice. Much depends upon a man's 
ability in selecting advisers and in judging men. It 
is true that as a rule the engineer has not been as 
close a student of men as the lawyer, and that he has 
not been as well able to select advisers and to judge 
of men as the lawyer, but this again is an individual 
matter and there is no reason why it should be so. 

All the above points to the necessity of a broad 
training for the engineer, and it shows that if capable 
men enter the profession they will find in it a field for 
their activities which has almost unlimited possibilities. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEER 

When it is recognized how wide the field of civil 
engineering is, how many necessary and constantly ex- 
panding fields of human industry it touches, it becomes 
evident that notwithstanding necessary variations in 
business activity, the outlook for the civil engineer must 
be good, and the demand for his services constantly — 
though not uniformly — increasing. It cannot be other- 
wise unless the progress of industry is to permanently 
retrogress. The appreciation of his services, and the 
compensation paid him, must also increase. There has 
been a noticeable improvement in this respect in the last 
few decades. There will, of course, be periods of busi- 
ness depression, when numbers of engineers, as of other 
men, will be out of employment, but the general trend 
will be upward. This is particularly so in view of the 
opportunities that an engineering training offers of 
engaging in business, in administrative and other posi- 
tions where engineering knowledge is necessary or desir- 
able, and in view of the fact that the habits of prompt 
decision, initiative, resource, and ability to meet new 
conditions — all of which habits should be developed 
by an engineering education and by engineering ex- 
perience — are potent elements in success. 

177 



178 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

This has been recently abundantly and conclusively 
demonstrated by the events of the Great War. It has 
been the testimony of practically all Americans who 
had charge of important departments in that War that 
the men who had had a technical training made the best 
showing. Secretary Weeks is reported to have said 
recently, regarding the War Department, "The records 
of the department show that of the officers of our 
armies who served overseas the best results were shown 
by those who had technical training in addition to their 
military education." The same is true of the men who 
did not go overseas, but who had to do with the mani- 
fold war activities at home. The selecting of Mr. 
Hoover as a member of the cabinet of President Hard- 
ing is a recognition of the same fact. 

The day of the engineer is approaching, not only of 
the civil engineer, but of the engineer in any branch 
of the profession. The time is coming, and coming 
rapidly, when it will be generally recognized that the 
man who can intelligently control and use the forces 
and materials of nature for the convenience of man is 
the one who can be depended upon to direct the largest 
undertakings, and who is perhaps the largest factor 
in national progress and prosperity. 

Mankind has passed through various "ages." The 
present age is the age of power. Almost every human 
activity, even farming, depends upon the development 
and application of power. The development and use 
of power is the function of the engineer — mechanical, 
electrical, and civil — so that the age of power, now 



THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEER 179 

only in its beginnings, must more and more require and 
recognize the engineer. 

Moreover, war is now more a matter of engineering 
than of anything else. The Great War was a conflict 
of engineers. No longer do knights in polished armor 
decide by individual prowess the fate of nations, but 
wars are won by the side that can best use and direct 
the forces and materials of nature — unfortunately not 
for the benefit of man — but for his destruction. We 
all hope that wars may cease, and that these great 
agencies of destruction may be turned to other uses ; 
but all this illustrates that the age is one of power — of 
engineering. The Great War has impressed this fact 
upon the mind of the coming generation. Young men's 
minds are now full of thoughts about mechanical ap- 
pliances. Technical schools are growing faster than 
schools of arts. What is needed is that the most cap- 
able young men of the coming generation should realize 
the opportunity offered by a technical training. 

The saying that you cannot make a silk purse out of 
a sow's ear, while its literal correctness has been of late 
disputed and possibly disproved, remains in principle 
as true as it ever was. You cannot develop from a 
seed more than the potentialities that are in it. You 
cannot develop in a man more than the possibilities that 
are in him. It will some day be recognized that an en- 
gineering training is the best preparation for business, 
and our capable young men will in increasing numbers 
attend the engineering schools. 

Reference has already been made to the fact that 



180 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

in universities where the engineering school has been 
given adequate support, endowment, and recognition, 
it has often, if not generally, outstripped the college 
of "arts and letters," and this will be increasingly 
the case. Independent technical schools, too, are grow- 
ing fast, and seem to have, more than the colleges, the 
confidence and support of the leaders of industry. The 
latter are more often dependent upon appeals to the 
loyalty of alumni, while the technical schools more 
often enlist the interest of industrial leaders of wealth 
and influence who are not college graduates. The 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, little more than 
fifty years old, is now larger than many universities, 
and if it could handle properly all the students who 
would like to go there, it could be as large as it pleased. 
But size does not necessarily mean efficiency, and this 
only illustrates the trend of the times. 

Our universities should not ignore the handwriting 
on the wall, and should realize the necessity of filling 
the great needs of the future in applied science. They 
must overcome the prejudice in favor of a so-called 
"culture" which is merely a superficial veneer, without 
thoroughness or discipline, while doing all they can to 
promote true culture, combined with discipline, and to 
bring out the best and highest that is in each student. 
On the other hand, students of engineering must 
broaden themselves beyond the narrow limits of their 
professional studies, and qualify themselves to deal 
with the great problems of the day, to use the mother 
tongue correctly, to gain acquaintance with other Ian- 



THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEER 181 

guages and literatures, and with the thoughts and deeds 
of great men. 

Statistics are very unreliable, unless one knows how 
they are obtained, what they include and what they 
exclude, but the following may be given. In 1880 and 
in 1910 the numbers of practitioners in three profes- 
sions were, according to the United States Cen- 
sus: 

1880 I 1910 



Civil Engineers and Surveyors 8,261 

Lawyers 64,137 

Physicians and Surgeons 85,671 



58,963 
114,704 
151,132 



The number of engineers in 1910 includes mining en- 
gineers, but it is probable that there were few mining 
engineers in 1880, so that the figures may be compar- 
able. From these it follows that the increase in civil- 
engineers in 30 years has been 613 per cent., of lawyers 
79 per cent., of physicians and surgeons 78 per cent. 
In reality, the growth in numbers of engineers has 
probably been even greater: for while every lawyer or 
physician has probably been correctly registered, there 
are no doubt many men who are really civil engineers 
by training, but who occupied administrative or other 
business positions in 1910, and were not registered as 
engineers. 

Similar results are shown by every other comparison 
that the writer has made. For instance, the growth of 
engineering students in some of our colleges is indicated 
by the following table: 



182 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

1880-81 1920-21 Percent. 

Number of students in Civil and increase 

Sanitary Engineeering Dept. of 
the Mass. Inst, of Technology 14 392 2,700 

Total number of students in the 

Mass. Inst, of Technology 335 3,436 926 

Number of students in the Rens- 
selaer Polytechnic Inst. 104 1,093 951 

Number of students in the Har- 
vard Medical School 241 439 82 

Number of students in the Har- 
vard Law School 156 944 505 

Another measure is afforded by the growth of en- 
gineering societies, as shown by the following table. 
Comparisons between the different societies must not 
be too closely drawn, because of differences in entrance 
requirements, "drives'* for increasing the membership 
(of which there have been none in the Society of Civil 
Engineers), etc. 

MEMBERSHIP IN 
AMERICAN SOCIETY OF CIVIL ENGINEERS 
AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF MINING AND METAL- 
LURGICAL ENGINEERS 
AMERICAN SOCIETY OF MECHANICAL EN 
GINEERS 
AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ELECTRICAL EN- 
GINEERS 

1870-1920 



1870 
80 
90 

1900 
10 
20 



Civil 


Mining 


Mechanical 


Electrical 


243 








601 


829 






1,296 


1,961 


1,029 


488 


2,199 


2,748 


1,951 


1,224 


5,292 


3,874 


3,832 


6,719 


9,907 


9,307 


13,173 


10,692 



THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEEE 183 

The engineering problems presented for solution by 
the engineer are increasing, not only in number, but in 
magnitude and importance. Within a few years, 
Boston, New York, and Los Angeles, as well as many 
other cities, have had to provide new supplies of water. 
Others have had to enlarge or modify their methods 
of disposing of sewage, and rendering it innocuous. 

In the new water supply for New York, there were at 
one time 303 engineers of the higher grades employed, 
and 471 engineering assistants, draughtsmen, in- 
spectors, rodmen, etc. The amount expended on this 
work to August, 1921, was $146,606,000, the contract 
work in progress was estimated at $16,278,000, and the 
additional amount necessary to complete the work was 
$16,000,000; making a total cost in round numbers, of 
$180,000,000. The plan and estimate for this project 
were prepared within a space of time of five weeks, fol- 
lowing the preliminary studies, and the original plan 
has been adhered to with but slight modifications. The 
total sum of $180,000,000 is only $3,000,000 in ex- 
cess of the original estimate, notwithstanding the fact 
that from 1916 to date there has been a material in- 
crease in prices, but for which the whole work would 
be completed well within the original estimate. This 
is a remarkable record, and reflects great credit upon 
the Chief Engineer, Mr. J. Waldo Smith, and the en- 
gineering staff. This work delivers to New York an 
additional supply of over 300,000,000 gallons daily, 
from the Catskill Mountains. The maximum number 
of employees of the Board of Water Supply at any time 



184 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

was 1,757, and the maximum contractors* forces about 
17,000. In addition, many men were engaged in manu- 
factories, specially on this work, bringing the grand 
total to about 25,000. This work stands "in a class by 
itself, and no other aqueduct, ancient or modern, ap- 
proaches it in size and capacity." It has been termed 
"the greatest system of municipal water works in all 
the world." 

In a similar class stands the great system of sub- 
ways and elevated lines providing transportation in 
New York City. "When this work was at its peak, in 
1915 and 1916, the contractors' forces numbered about 
20,000 men, and the maximum force, of all grades, em- 
ployed by the Engineering Department, was 2,127 in 
December 1915." At the end of 1920 there was in use 
"a total track mileage of elevated and subway lines 
of 601.2 miles out of the total of 618.7 miles embraced 
in the entire Dual Rapid Transit System." "Expendi- 
tures by the city and the operating companies for con- 
struction and equipment under the dual contracts and 
related certificates signed in 1913, have been approxi- 
mately $435,000,000, including outlays provided for on 
the work completed or nearing completion." Great as 
has been the expenditure for the New York Water 
Supply, the above cost of rapid transit lines has been 
nearly 2^ times as great, — and all since 1913. And 
this, of course, does not include the Pennsylvania Rail- 
road tunnel, the Hudson and Manhattan tubes, or the 
connection between the Pennsylvania and the New 
Haven lines, over Long Island and across Hell Gate. 



THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEER 185 

Many engineers are employed in valuation work. In 
the valuation of the railroads of the United States by 
the Interstate Commerce Commission, the greatest num- 
ber of engineers was in 1919, when the total number, 
including clerical forces associated with the engineers, 
was 1,400, In August, 1921, the number was 325, as 
the work is approaching completion. 

Examples of this kind might be multiplied indefinitely 
if desired. Mention of some of the large projects of 
recent years has been made in preceding chapters. 

In 1913, a committee of the Am. Soc. C. E. was ap- 
pointed to investigate the conditions of employment of, 
and compensation of, civil engineers. This committee 
received only 6,378 available replies to its questions, 
and it appeared that after one year of experience the 
average compensation was $1,187, and the maximum 
$2,000 ; after two years the maximum was $5,000 ; 
after 5 years the average was $1,935, the maximum 
$12,000; after 18 years the average was $5,181, the 
maximum $150,000. It also appeared that the aver- 
age yearly compensation of 4,529 graduates of tech- 
nical schools was $3,982, and of 1,829 non-graduates, 
$3,993. Figures of this kind are of little value, be- 
cause of the small number of cases and for other rea- 
sons, but it does appear clearly that civil engineering 
offers abundant opportunity for able men. While the 
average compensation appears low, we have no figures 
of the average earnings of the lawyer or physician, and 
it may be doubted if they are higher. It is probable 
that the young engineer reaches a self-sustaining posi- 



186 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

tion, where he is able to support himself and his family, 
much sooner than the average lawyer or physician. 
Further, comparisons of this kind take no account of 
native ability. For the average engineer to complain 
because the brilliant lawyer or surgeon receives much 
higher fees, is, of course, only a manifestation of that 
most undesirable human passion, envy. The real ques- 
tion is as to the comparative opportunities for service, 
and the comparative remuneration, for men of equal 
ability and character. This is why the writer maintains 
that the opportunities offered in engineering are good, 
and increasing in attractiveness, and that what is 
needed is to induce greater numbers of capable young 
men, of good character, to enter the profession. In 
thinking of compensation, too, it should be remembered 
that the salary of the Chief Justice of the United 
States Supreme Court, the highest judicial position in 
America, is $15,000. And as illustrating inevitable 
discrepancies in other fields, it may be mentioned that 
while the Ambassador of the United States at the 
Court of St. James receives $17,500 per annum, the 
British Ambassador at Washington receives £20,000 
per annum, and his house. 

Comparisons are dangerous, and often unprofitable 
and merely provocative of discontent. The main points 
to be kept in mind are that a man's success depends 
mainly upon himself ; that money is not the true meas- 
ure of success ; and that civil engineering is a vocation 
that is healthy, free from many of the worries that 
harass the lawyer, physician, or business man, and 



THE OUTLOOK FOR THE CIVIL ENGINEEU 187 

which offers abundant opportunity for creative effort, 
and for constructing works that conduce each day to 
the comfort and convenience, and supply the necessities, 
of great numbers of our fellow men. 
Lord Bacon said: 

"There be three things which make a nation great and 
prosperous: a fertile soil, busy workshops, and the easy 
conveyance of men and commodities from one place to an- 
other." 

The last two of these requisites constitute distinctly 
the field of the engineer, and even the utilization of a 
fertile soil is largely dependent upon his activity, 
through irrigation, drainage, and other engineering 
functions. Even Lord Bacon, therefore, must have 
recognized in his day that the engineer was the main 
factor in making a nation great and prosperous. 



CHAPTER VII 
CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 

Little remains except to offer some concluding sug- 
gestions to young men who may be contemplating fol- 
lowing the profession of civil engineering. 

Study yourself thoroughly before deciding upon 
any career, and get the advice of those who know your 
habits of mind and your peculiarities, and who can 
judge of your fitness. Remember that there are few 
men who will fit but one narrow occupation, but that 
most men would do equally well in any one of several. 
There are of course certain occupations which differ 
so radically from certain others, that a man fitted for 
the former would lack the qualities requisite for the 
latter; and some men are so peculiarly constituted 
that they are fitted for but one niche in life. Such men, 
however, are in the writer's opinion rare. Even the 
artistic temperament is not inconsistent with ability in 
engineering. F. Hopkinson Smith was not only a good 
engineer, but a delightful writer, and an artist of dis- 
tinction; and the writer knows another distinguished 
engineer who would certainly have made a success as 
an artist; and several artists who were trained as 
engineers, and who lose no opportunity to express 
their sense of obligation to such training. The writer 
also knows several clergymen who were trained as engi- 

188 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 189 

neers, one of whom practiced engineering for some 
years ; and a number of lawyers who had the same 
training and experience. But chance, or fate, or choice 
will generally soon determine a man's career, and then 
he must specialize; and there are few who, like Hop- 
kinson Smith, can practice more than one occupation. 

Having determined upon civil engineering as a career, 
train yourself by practicing the qualities that will 
make you successful. Read the biographies of engi- 
neers and the history of engineering, and learn the 
difficulties that have beset engineers and the manner 
in which they have been surmounted. Above all, observe 
the qualities — of mind, body and character — which 
are requisite, and develop them by daily exercise. 

Train yourself in observation and in the habit of 
quick decision. If two men walk down the street to- 
gether, one may see much more than the other. One 
may be habitually immersed in thought, and may see 
little: and while the engineer must think, this habit, 
which prevents observation, is not a good one if carried 
too far. The game which sometimes played, by which 
each person is allowed a short time to look at a table 
on which are a number of objects and is then required 
to make a list of what he saw, is good for developing 
this faculty. Visual testimony is often quite erroneous. 
If a man swears that he saw a thing happen, that does 
not prove that it did happen. For this reason, the 
writer likes to see sleight of hand exhibitions, which 
make him realize that seeing is not believing, and that 
the testimony of the senses is not always reliable. 



190 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

Remember that engineering is practical, not abstract, 
and is more common-sense than anything else. Do not 
let anything train the common-sense out of you. Think 
isefore you ask a question, so that you will not ask 
a fool question; and see first if you cannot answer it 
yourself. Train yourself in estimating distances 
and quantities, and to measure distances by pacing. 
If you see a big boulder in a field, try to estimate what 
it weighs ; then measure it approximately and see how 
near you came. 

Pick up all sorts of scraps of information that may 
help you, and keep a note book or a card catalogue in 
which you record them. The cost of work, the number 
of men employed on a job, the time it took to complete 
it, all may be useful at some time; and such data, 
from personal experience, will always command more 
respect than quotations from books. 

Train yourself in mental arithmetic, and so learn to 
get results quickly without pencil and paper. The 
judgment of some men, regarding such things as the 
quantity of earthwork on a line of railroad, or the 
value of property, is sometimes of greater value and 
accuracy than the results of long calculations, and 
sometimes there is not time or opportunity to perform 
the latter. 

Do not be discouraged if you cannot get an educa- 
tion in college or technical school. Remember that 
many of the most eminent engineers had none. The lack 
of it will be a handicap to you for a time, provided 
that you could really profit by it; but make up your 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 191 

mind to turn that stumbling block into a stepping 
stone, and that by being obliged to get this knowledge 
and training under difficulties you will get it more 
thoroughly. But do not deceive yourself and stub- 
bornly persist in thinking you can be a successful en- 
gineer when you really have not a scientific mind. Do 
not think that because you have always been interested 
in locomotives or automobiles, or played with me- 
chanical toys, or plastered your room with pictures 
from the Scientific American, you are cut out for an 
engineer. Remember that engineering is a science, and 
that to succeed in it you must master the fundamental 
principles of chemistry, physics, mathematics and me- 
chanics, and the properties of materials. If you cannot 
do this, you may be a good mechanic, or you may even 
be a good administrator or business man, but you will 
not be an engineer. 

Learn above all things, whether you go to college or 
not, how to study, so that you can take up a new sub- 
ject and master it yourself. You will very likely be 
helped in doing this by the writer's pamphlet, "How 
to Study," published by McGraw, Hill & Co., which you 
should read and reread until you have absorbed its 
atmosphere. Let your studies, especially of mathe- 
matics, be concrete, not abstract, and scrutinize care- 
fully the data or assumptions upon which a theory 
rests. Do not let your mind go to sleep over alge- 
braical formulae, but translate them into practical re- 
sults which can be expressed in words. Systematize 
and arrange your knowledge. When you are studying 



192 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

a subject, get the fundamental principles, and let 
them be like the trunk and main branches of a tree, 
upon which you can hang all subordinate principles or 
facts, each in its proper place. 

Do not get the habit of seeking the easy way by evad- 
ing difficulties, but accustom yourself to surmount 
them. This does not mean that you should make 
difficulties, or pursue complicated or abstruse methods 
where an easy or obvious one will give the same result. 
This is often done in mathematics, and is vicious. 
Where an easy way will lead to the result, it should, of 
course, be chosen ; for there is abundant opportunity to 
cope with difficulties without creating them. But do not 
evade them; and, in college, choose subjects of study 
that will tax and develop your powers rather than 
those which make little demand on them, as so many 
students do. Under the elective system the writer 
knows of college students who have selected schemes of 
study requiring nominally only 25 to 30 hours a week ; 
or which required no work in the afternoon, or nothing 
before ten o'clock in the morning. Think of it! — an 
able-bodied young man, faced with greater opportuni- 
ties than he will ever have again, to afford him which 
parents or relatives at home are perhaps denying them- 
selves comforts that they need, deliberately trying to 
do as little as would "put it over" or pull him through ! 
For such an attitude parents are often more to blame 
than the students or college authorities, some of such 
parents objecting if their sons are made to work hard, 
and being more desirous that they should become prom- 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 193 

inent in athletics or in the social clubs. It may be true, 
as Emerson says, that "You send your child to the 
schoolmaster: but 'tis the schoolboys who educate 
him": but that does not mean that they should not 
exert themselves to learn as much as they can from 
their schoolmaster, and seize every opportunity to 
develop their powers. 

To make one suggestion regarding personal habits, 
the writer strongly advises young men in college or in 
engineering, not to smoke during working hours. The 
writer is a smoker, but he did not smoke at all until 
after he was thirty-five. Many successful engineers 
are great smokers and many do not smoke at all. If 
you must smoke, do it at home in the evening. During 
working hours your time and your best efforts belong 
to your employer, and your efficiency will be diminished 
if you smoke. Some engineering offices and industrial 
establishments do not allow smoking during working 
hours, and that is right. The same principles are true 
about work in college, and the student will do best for 
himself by not smoking at all. But unfortunately the 
idea often prevails that a boy does not become a man 
until he smokes, and many college students like to 
make believe they are men as early as possible. 

When you graduate from college and look for a job, 
be willing to begin at the bottom, at small wages, and to 
do anything that is useful. Have no high-flown ideas 
about what is dignified. All labor is dignified; it is 
loafing that is undignified. Do not think that because 
jou have a diploma you can begin at or near the top. 



194 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

Remember that a diploma does not guarantee a single 
good quality: a man may be lazy, or incompetent, or 
dishonest, and yet possess one. Much depends upon the 
college and its standards, but the above statement is 
true for all. All the diploma shows is that its possessor 
managed to do enough, and well enough, to get it. It 
may, therefore, mean a certain amount of competence, 
but the standard, even in our best colleges and technical 
schools, is low compared with that which an ambitious 
young man should have for himself. When you go to 
work, you should begin at the bottom, in overalls or at 
a desk or draughting table. For some time you will 
not be worth anything to your employer, except in 
manual labor, for you must learn his business and 
his methods. You must expect to work under young 
men of your own age who did not go to college. They 
have something that you have not, namely, experience; 
but if you have things — ^principles and knowledge and 
mental training — that they have not, you may expect, 
as you gain experience, — other things equal, — to pass 
them in the race, unless they can gain the things that 
you got in college faster than you can gain the ex- 
perience. It is surprising how many college graduates 
think themselves qualified to begin at the top, because 
they have been studying books or listening to lectures ; 
and that it is unworthy of their education for them 
to work under men of their own age who have not been 
to college. Even the schools sometimes foster the idea 
that they can prepare young .men to begin as "man- 
agers" or administrators, omitting the routine of ex- 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 195 

perience. It is a fallacy. It cannot be done. There 
is routine and drudgery in every occupation. You must 
be able to perform it cheerfully, uncomplainingly, and 
well. 

The young man taking a job should be willing to do 
anything, and when he has finished one piece of work 
should ask for another, not wait till it is brought to 
him; and he should not watch the clock. The writer 
once sent two young men from the same class to work 
in the same office. One strove to do all he could ; when 
one job was finished he asked for another, and he stayed 
after hours if by doing so he could help his employer. 
He rose to the highest position in the concern. The 
other had his eye on the clock, stopped promptly when 
the bell rang, and when he finished one job read a 
newspaper till he was told to do something else. When 
the first man had reached nearly the highest round of 
the ladder, the second was not far beyond where he 
started. 

I would strongly advise young men in college to work 
summers. A healthy boy of eighteen or twenty does 
not need to loaf three or four months each summer at 
a resort. A few weeks' vacation should be enough, and 
during the remaining time he may be gaining experience, 
and perhaps getting a foothold in some concern that 
will take him permanently after he graduates. He will 
appreciate his studies better if he sees their appli- 
cation. This principle of cooperative work between 
the schools and the industries has led, of recent years, 
to systematic curricula in which the student spends 



196 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

alternate periods in the school and in the industry, 
with only a few weeks of vacation in the year. This 
plan has met with great success at the Universities of 
Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, and has recently been put 
into operation at Harvard University. 

The young engineer, with all his zeal for mental and 
material progress, should not neglect his moral and 
spiritual development. He should bear in mind that 
his profession ds one directed to the benefit of man- 
kind. He should study men, learn how to deal with 
them and direct them, how to get the best work from 
them, and by a human and sympathetic attitude toward 
their problems and their points of view, gain their co- 
operation and esteem. Engineering has to do with men 
as well as materials, and it is as important to know 
how to deal with one as with the other. 

Many professional societies have adopted codes or 
canons of ethics as guides for the conduct of their 
members. The Massachusetts Medical Society has a 
short code of seven paragraphs. The American Bar 
Association has given much consideration to this sub- 
ject. A committee of this Association submitted an 
interesting report in 1907 containing a compilation 
of the codes of ethics adopted by the various state bar 
associations, and also containing Hoffman's fifty reso- 
lutions in regard to professional deportment, which 
were framed by David Hoffman, of the Baltimore Bar, 
for adoption by his students on admission to the bar 
"as guides never to be departed from and to which they 
will ever be faithful." The Association adopted in 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 197 

1908 a set of canons dealing with the responsibilities 
and duties of lawyers and their professional conduct, 
with an oath of admission requiring the observance 
of the highest moral principles. It may be remarked 
that there is perhaps more need for such a code in the 
legal profession than in others. George Sharswood, the 
author of "An Essay on Professional Ethics," referring 
to the legal profession, made the following statement: 

"There is certainly, without any exception, no profession 
in which so many temptations beset the path to swerve from 
the line of strict integrity, in which so many delicate and 
difficult questions of duty are continually arising. There 
are pitfalls and mantraps at every step, and the mere youth, 
at the very outset of his career, needs often the prudence 
and self-denial as well as the moral courage, which belong 
commonly to riper years. High moral principle is the only 
safe guide, the only torch to light his way amidst darkness 
and obstruction." 

It is well to have such a code, and yet, when all is 
said and done, if a man has not the principles of moral- 
ity in his soul, such a code will not hold him up to the 
highest moral standard, though it may give ground for 
punishment or for disbarring him from practice if he 
violates its canons. 

Architects and engineers have adopted codes of 
ethics, but they are generally short and do not attempt 
to go into all the details of what an engineer should or 
should not do. The code of the American Society of 
Civil Engineers is as follows : 



198 THE YOUNG MAN AND CIVIL ENGINEERING 

CODE OF ETHICS 

of the 
American Society of Civil Engineers 

It shall be considered unprofessional and inconsistent 
with honorable and dignified bearing for any member of the 
American Society of Civil Engineers: 

1. To act for his clients in professional matters other- 
wise than as a faithful agent or trustee, or to accept any 
remuneration other than his stated charges for services 
rendered his clients. 

2. To attempt to injure falsely or maliciously, directly 
or indirectly, the professional reputation, prospects, or busi- 
ness, of another Engineer. 

3. To attempt to supplant another Engineer after def- 
inite steps have been taken toward his employment. 

4. To compete with another Engineer for employment 
on the basis of professional charges, by reducing his usual 
charges and in this manner attempting to underbid after 
being informed of the charges named by another. 

5. To review the work of another Engineer for the same 
client, except with the knowledge or consent of such En- 
gineer, or unless the connection of such Engineer with 
the work has been terminated. 

6. To advertise in self-laudatory language, or in any 
other manner derogatory to the dignity of the Profession. 

Much is said in these days about ideals, and we are 
urged to form them in the mind and try to realize them 
in fact. That is well if the ideals — or aims, as they 
should be called — are good, and possible of attainment. 
But great harm may be done by forming in the mind an 
imaginary ideal, without a study of facts, and then 
striving to reach it. There are great dangers in the 
pursuit of impractical ideals. After study of the facts 
of a problem or a situation, such as the engineer is 



CONCLUDING SUGGESTIONS 199 

accustomed to make, it may be decided what is best 
to do under the circumstances. Canon Kingsley said: 
"The only way to regenerate the world is to do the duty 
that lies nearest.'* But there is one aim that the young 
engineer may and should steadily and unfalteringly 
aim for, and that is to improve his own personal char- 
acter. This aim or ideal may well be that expressed 
in the following verses: 

"I would be true, for there are those who trust me; 
I would be pure, for there are those who care: 
I would be strong, for there is much to suffer; 
I would be brave, for there is much to dare: 
I would be friend to all — the foe, the friendless; 
I would be giver, and forget the gift: 
I would be humble, for I know my weakness: 
I would look up, and laugh, and love, and lift." 



INDEX 



Allen, Horatio, 44 

American Society of Civil En- 
gineers, 16, 182, 198 

American Society for Testing 
Materials, 99 

Arkwright, Richard, 12 

Ashtabula Bridge, 159 

Bacon, Lord, quoted, 187 
Baynes, Thomas S., quoted, 126 
Bowie, WilHam, 36 
Brindley, James, 14 
Bryant, Gridley, 44 
Buckle, T. H., quoted, 5 
Building Construction, 82-84 
Bureau of Public Roads, 54 

Canals, 14, 62-65 

Cartwright, Edmund, 12 

City Managers, 85 

Civil Engineering: branches, 
27; characteristics, 153; com- 
parison with other profes- 
sions, 159-171 ; develops ac- 
curacy, 156; develops char- 
acter, 155; develops logical 
thought, 156; develops a 
sense of responsibility, 158; 
does not deal in sentiment, 
155, 166; fees, 167, 170; 
healthful, 161 ; a preparation 
for business, 160; out-door 
work, 30; necessary qualifi- 
cations, 90; outlook, 177 

Civil Engineers: earnings, 185; 
growth in numbers, 181; va- 
riable demand for, 165. 

Civilization, progress of, 23, 39 

Coast works, 66 



Corps des Fonts et Chaussdes, 

25 
Cort, Henry, 12 
Crompton, Samuel, 12 
Crocker, George G., 43, 45 
Culture, 126 

Draper, Dr. John W., quoted, 
113 

Eads, James B., 67 

East Boston Tunnel, 33 

Economy, 101 

Eddystone lighthouse, 67 

Eiffel Tower, 83 

Ellicott, Maj. Andrew, 38 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo, quoted, 
193 

Engineering: a science, 3; a 
learned profession, 3; defi- 
nition, 7, 9, 10; education, 
113; electrical, 15; extent of, 
1, 22; importance of, 124; in 
the great war, 178; mechan- 
ical, 13; societies, 16, 182; 
the main element in the prog- 
ress of civilization, 23, 24, 
39 

Engineers, as Administrators, 
174 

Erie Canal, 34, 64 

Ethics, 197 

Experience, importance of. 111 

Faris, R. L., 36 
Fees, 170 
Fisher, E. A., 86 
Flexner, A., quoted, 121 
Floods, 62 



201 



202 



INDEX 



Forth Bridge, 81 
Fulton, Robert, 12 

Garbage Disposal, 77 
Gayley, C. M., quoted, 122 
Geddes, James, 34 
Geodesy, 19, 35 
Gibbon, Edward, 43, 51, 124 
Gorgas, Wm. C, 78 
Grandgent, C. H., quoted, 123 
Grant, Gen. U. S,, 42 

Harbor "Works, 66 

Hargreaves, James, 12 

Harriman, Edward H., 49 

Hayford, John F., 36 

Hell Gate, 66 

Hetch Hetchy, 75 

Highway engineering, 20, 51 

Hoosac Tunnel, 33 

Hughes, Chas. E., quoted, 156 

Hydraulic engineering, 17, 20 

Hydraulics, 90, 58 

Ideals, 143, 199 
Irrigation, 68 

Jackson, William, 86 

Keller, A. G., quoted, 138 
Kingsley, Canon, quoted, 199 

Lake Dwellers' Village, 4 
Learned Professions, 3, 22, 117 
Lighthouses, 67-68 
Lodge, Henry Cabot, quoted, 

121 
Logic, importance of study of, 

96 
Lucin cut-ofiF, 49 

McAdam, L. J., 51 

Macaulay, Lord, quoted, 39 

Materials, 98 

Mathematics, 94 

Mental Balance, importance of, 

104, 108 
Middlesex Canal, 44 



Mill, John Stuart, quoted, 96 
Mine Surveying, 32 
Motor transportation, 56, 57 
Municipal engineering, 20, 85 

Nasmyth, James, 10 

Panama Canal, 64 
Pavements, street, 53 
Perronet, J. R., 26 
Pritchett, H. S., quoted, 121 
Profession, a, defined, 5 
Pyramids of Egypt, 5 

Qualifications of the civil en 
gineer: personal, 108; pro» 
fessional, 91 

Quebec Bridge, 81, 159 

Railroad engineering, 13, 19, 30, 
39 

Railway travel, safety of,, 50 

Railways, early EngUsh, 46 

Reclamation, 69 

River mouths, 66 

Roads: construction, 51; Eng- 
lish, 40; expense of, 54-56; 
Roman, 43, 51 

Sanitary engineering, 20, 69 
Schurman, Jacob G., quoted, 

122 
Sewerage, 76 
Smeaton, 68 
Smith, J. Waldo, 183 
Socialism, 141 
Stephenson, Robert, 12, 46, 63, 

115 
Stott, Henry G., quoted, 9 
Street cleaning, 77 
Structural engineering, 20, 79 
Subways, 48, 49 
Suez Canal, 5, 61, 63 
Sumner, William G., quoted, 

123 
Surveying, 19-28; accuracy of, 

34-38; of State boundaries, 

38; of mines, 32 



Swamp drainage, 78 



INDEX 203 

Valuation of properties, 20, 87 



Telford, Thomas, 51 

Travel, in New England, 41; 

difficulties of, 40-43 
Tredgold, Thomas, 7, 11, 13, 

19, 22 
Tresaguet, P. M. J., 51 
Tunnels, 32, 33 

Union Pacific Railroad, 49 
U. S. Coast and Geodetic Sur- 
vey, 35 
U. S. Geological Survey, 35 



Waite, H. M., 85 

Walker, Francis A., quoted, 115 

Waring, Col. Geo. E., 78 

Washington Monument, 83 

Water Power, 59-62 

Water Supply, 70-75 

Watt, James, 12 

Weeks, John W., quoted, 178 

Westminster Abbey, engineers 

in, 175 
Whipple, Geo. C, 79 
Woolworth Building, 84 



